THE 

LIFE    OF    CHRIST. 


7*$ 


THE 


FREDERIC    W.     FARRAR,    D.D.,     F.R.S.; 


LATE  FELLOW  OF  TR1N1TT   COLLEGE,   CAMBRIDGE  ; 

MASTEB     Of    MARLBOHO'w'OH     COLLEGE  ;    AM      CHAPLAIN    IN    OllDINAUY 
TO  THE  QUEBH. 


MAHET  1MMOTA  FIDSS. 


^    |!ctD  gork: 

E.    P.    BUTTON    &     COMPANY, 
713,  BROADWAY. 


PEEFACE. 


IN  fulfilling  a  task  so  difficult  and  so  important  as  that  of  writing  the 
Life  of  Christ,  I  feel  it  to  be  a  duty  to  state  the  causes  which  led  me 
to  undertake  it,  and  the  principles  which  have  guided  me  in  carrying 
it  to  a  conclusion. 

1.  It  has  long  been  the  desire  and  aim  of  the  publishers  of  thia 
work  to  spread  as  widely  as  possible  the  blessings  of  knowledge  ;  and, 
in  special  furtherance  of  this  design,  they  wished  to  place  in  the  hands 
of  their  readers  such  a  sketch  of  the  Life  of  Christ  on  earth  as  should 
enable  them  to  realise  it  more  clearly,  and  to  enter  more  thoroughly 
into  the  details  and  sequence  of  the  Gospel  narratives.  They  therefore 
applied  originally  to  an  eminent  theologian,  who  accepted  the  proposal, 
Lut  whose  elevation  to  the  Episcopate  prevented  him  from  carrying  it 
out. 

Under  these  circumstances  application  was  made  to  me,  and  I 
could  not  at  first  but  shrink  from  a  labour  for  which  I  felt  that 
the  amplest  leisure  of  a  lifetime  would  be  insufficient,  and  powers 
incomparably  greater  than  my  own  would  still  be  utterly  inadequate. 
But  the  considerations  that  were  urged  upon  me  came  no  doubt  with 
additional  force  from  the  deep  interest  with  which,  from  the  first,  1 
contemplated  the  design.  I  consented  to  make  the  effort,  knowing 
that  I  could  at  least  promise  to  do  my  best,  and  believing  that  he  who 
does  the  best  he  can,  and  also  seeks  the  blessing  of  God  upon  his 
labours,  cannot  finally  and  wholly  fail. 

And  I  have  reason  to  be  thankful  that  I  originally  entered  upon  the 
task,  and,  in  spite  of  all  obstacles,  have  still  persevered  in  it.  If  the 
following  pages  in  any  measure  fulfil  the  objects  with  which  such  a 
Life  ought  to  be  written,  they  should  fill  the  minds  of  those  who  read 
them  with  solemn  and  not  ignoble  thoughts ;  they  should  '•  add  snn- 


71  PREFACE. 

light  to  daylight  by  making  the  happy  happier  ; "  they  should  encou- 
rage the  toiler ;  they  should  console  the  sorrowful ;  they  should  point 
the  weak  to  the  one  true  source  of  moral  strength.  But  whether  this 
book  be  thus  blessed  to  high  ends,  or  whether  it  be  received  with 
harshness  and  indifference,  nothing  at  least  can  rob  me  of  the  deep 
and  constant  happiness  which  I  have  felt  during  almost  every  hour 
that  has  been  spent  upon  it.  Though,  owing  to  serious  and  absorbing 
duties,  months  have  often  passed  without  my  finding  an  opportunity 
to  write  a  single  line,  yet,  even  in  the  midst  of  incessant  labour  at 
other  things,  nothing  forbade  that  the  subject  on  which  I  was  engaged 
should  be  often  in  my  thoughts,  or  that  I  should  find  in  it  a  source  of 
peace  and  happiness  different,  alike  in  kind  and  in  degree,  from  any 
which  other  interests  could  either  give  or  take  away. 

2.  After  I  had  in  some  small  measure  prepared  myself  for  the  task, 
I  seized,  in  the  year  1870,  the  earliest  possible  opportunity  to  visit 
Palestine,  and  especially  those  parts  of  it  which  will  be  for  ever  iden- 
tified with  the  work  of  Christ  on  earth.  Amid  those  scenes  wherein 
He  moved — in  the 


"holy  fields 


Over  whose  acres  walked  those  blessed  feet 
Which  eighteen  hundred  years  ago  were  nailed, 
For  our  advantage,  on  the  bitter  cross  " — 

in  the  midst  of  those  immemorial  customs  which  recalled  at  every  turn 
the  manner  of  life  He  lived — at  Jerusalem,  on  the  Mount  of  Olives,  at 
Bethlehem,  by  Jacob's  Well,  in  the  Valley  of  Nazareth,  along  the 
bright  strand  of  the  Sea  of  Galilee,  and  in  the  coasts  of  Tyre  and 
Sidon — many  things  came  home  to  me,  for  the  first  time,  with  a  reality 
and  vividness  unknown  before.  I  returned  more  than  ever  confirmed 
in  the  wish  to  tell  the  full  story  of  the  Gospels  in  such  a  manner  and 
with  such  illustrations  as — with  the  aid  of  all  that  was  within  my 
reach  of  that  knowledge  which  has  been  accumulating  for  centuries — 
might  serve  to  enable  at  least  the  simple  and  the  unlearned  to  under- 
stand and  enter  into  the  human  surroundings  of  the  life  of  the  Son 
of  God. 

3.  But,  while  I  say  this,  to  save  the  book  from  being  judged  by  a 
false  standard,  and  with  reference  to  ends  which  it  was  nover  intended 
to  accomplish,  it  would  be  mere  affectation  to  deny  that  I  have  hoped 
to  furnish  much  which  even  learned  readers  may  value.  Though  tho 
following  pnges  do  not  pretend  to  be  exhaustive  or  specially  erudite, 


PREFACB.  vii 

they  yet  contain  much  that  men  of  the  highest  learning  have  thought 
or  ascertained.  The  books  which  I  have  consulted  include  the 
researches  of  divines  who  have  had  the  privilege  of  devoting  to 
this  subject,  and  often  to  some  small  fragment  of  it,  the  best  years 
of  laborious  and  uninterrupted  lives.  No  one,  I  hope,  could  have 
reaped,  however  feebly,  among  such  harvests,  without  garnering  at 
least  something,  which  must  have  its  value  for  the  professed  theo- 
logian as  well  as  for  the  unlearned.  But,  with  this  double  aim  in 
view,  I  have  tried  to  avoid  "moving  as  in  a  strange  diagonal,"  and 
have  never  wholly  lost  sight  of  the  fact  that  I  had  to  work  with  no 
higher  object  than  that  thousands,  who  have  even  fewer  opportunities 
than  myself,  might  be  the  better  enabled  to  read  that  one  Book,  beside 
which  even  the  best  and  profoundest  treatises  are  nothing  better  than 
poor  and  stammering  fragments  of  imperfect  commentary. 

4.  It  is  perhaps  yet  more  important  to  add  that  this  Life  of  Christ 
is  avowedly  and  unconditionally  the  work  of  a  believer.  Those  who 
expect  to  find  in  it  new  theories  about  the  divine  personality  of  Jesus, 
or  brilliant  combinations  of  mythic  cloud  tinged  by  the  sunset  imagi- 
nation of  some  decadent  belief,  will  look  in  vain.  It  has  not  been 
written  with  any  direct  and  special  reference  to  the  attacks  of  sceptical 
criticism.  It  is  not  even  intended  to  deal  otherwise  than  indirectly 
with  the  serious  doubts  of  those  who,  almost  against  their  will,  think 
themselves  forced  to  lapse  into  a  state  of  honest  disbelief.  I  may 
indeed  venture  to  hope  that  such  readers,  if  they  follow  me  with  no 
unkindly  spirit  through  these  pages,  may  here  and  there  find  con- 
siderations of  real  weight  and  importance,  which  will  solve  imaginary 
difficulties  and  supply  an  answer  to  real  objections.  Although  this 
book  is  not  mainly  controversial,  and  would,  had  it  been  intended  as 
a  contribution  to  polemical  literature,  have  been  written  in  a  very 
different  manner,  I  do  not  believe  that  it  will  prove  wholly  valueless  to 
any  honest  doubter  who  reads  it  in  a  candid  and  uncontemptuous  spirit. 
Hundreds  of  critics,  for  instance,  have  impugned  the  authority  of  tho 
Gospels  on  the  score  of  the  real  or  supposed  contradictions  to  be  found 
in  them.  I  am  of  course  familiar  with  such  objections,  which  may  bo 
found  in  all  sorts  of  books,  from  Strauss's  Leben  Jesu  and  Benan's  Vie 
de  Jesus,  down  to  Sir  B.  Hanson's  Jesits  of  History,  and  the  English 
Life  of  Jesus  by  Mr.  Thomas  Scott.  But,  while  I  have  never  con- 
sciously evaded  a  distinct  and  formidable  difficulty,  I  have  constantly 
endeavoured  to  show,  by  the  mere  silent  course  of  the  narrative  itself, 


Vlll  PREFACE. 

that  many  of  these  objections  are  by  no  means  insuperable,  and  that 
many  more  are  unfairly  captious  or  altogether  fantastic. 

5.  If  there  are  questions  wider  and  deeper  than  the  minutiaa  of 
criticism,  into  which  I  have  not  fully  and  directly  entered,  it  is  not 
either  from  having  neglected  to  weigh  the  arguments  respecting  them, 
or  from  any  unwillingness  to  state  the  reasons  why,  in  common  with 
tens  of  thousands  who  are  abler  and  wiser  than  myself,  I  can  still  say 
respecting  every  fundamental  doctrine  of  the  Christian  faith,  MANET 
IMMOTA  FIDES.  Writing  as  a  believer  to  believers,  as  a  Christian  to 
Christians,  surely,  after  nearly  nineteen  centuries  of  Christianity,  any 
one  may  be  allowed  to  rest  a  fact  of  the  Life  of  Jesus  on  the  testimony 
of  St.  John  without  stopping  to  write  a  volume  on  the  authenticity  of 
the  Fourth  Gospel ;  or  may  narrate  one  of  the  Gospel  miracles  without 
deeming  it  necessary  to  answer  all  the  arguments  which  have  been 
urged  against  the  possibility  of  the  supernatural.  After  the  long 
labours,  the  powerful  reasoning,  and  the  perfect  historical  candour 
with  which  this  subject  has  been  treated  by  a  host  of  apologists,  it  is 
surely  as  needless  as  it  is  impossible  to  lay  again,  on  every  possible 
occasion,  the  very  lowest  foundations  of  our  faith. 

Nor  have  I  left  the  subject  of  the  credibility  of  miracles  and  the 
general  authenticity  of  the  Gospel  narratives  entirely  untouched, 
although  there  was  the  less  need  for  my  entering  fully  upon  those 
questions  in  the  following  pages,  from  my  having  already  stated  else- 
where, to  the  best  of  my  ability,  the  grounds  of  my  belief.  The  same 
remark  applies  to  the  yet  more  solemn  truth  of  the  Divinity  of  Christ. 
That — not  indeed  as  surrounded  with  all  the  recondite  enquiries  about 
the  Trept^ptja-K;  or  communicatio  idiomatum,  the  hypostatic  union, 
the  abstract  impeccability,  and  such  scholastic  formula?,  but  in  its 
'  broad  Scriptural  simplicity — was  the  subject  of  the  Hulsean  Lectures 
before  the  University  of  Cambridge  in  the  year  1870.  In  those  lec- 
tures I  endeavoured  to  sketch  what  has  ever  seemed  to  my  mind  the 
most  convincing  external  evidence  of  our  faith,  namely,  "  The  Witness 
of  History  to  Christ."  Those  who  have  rejected  the  creed  of  the- 
Church  in  this  particular,  approach  the  subject  from  a  totally 
opposite  point  to  our  own.  They  read  the  earlier  chapters  of  St. 
Luke  and  St.  Matthew,  and  openly  mai-vel  that  any  mind  can  believe 
what  to  them  appears  to  be  palpable  mythology ;  or  they  hear  the  story 
of  one  of  Christ's  miracles  of  power — the  walking  on  the  Sea  of 
Galilee,  or  turning  the  water  into  wine — and  scarcely  conceal  their 
\ 


PREFACE.  IX 

insinuated  misgiving  as  to  honesty  of  those  who  can  accept  such 
narratives  as  true.  Doubtless  we  should  share  their  convictions  in 
these  respects,  if  we  approached  the  subject  in  the  same  spirit  and 
by  the  same  avenues.  To  show  that  we  do  not  and  why  we  do  not  so 
approach  it,  is — incidentally  at  least — one  of  the  objects  of  this  book. 

The  sceptic — and  let  me  here  say  at  once  that  I  hope  to  use  no 
single  word  of  anger  or  denunciation  against  a  scepticism  which  I  know 
to  be  in  many  cases  perfectly  honest  and  self-sacrificingly  noble — 
approaches  the  examination  of  the  question  from  a  point  of  view  the 
very  opposite  to  that  of  the  believer.  He  looks  at  the  majestic  order 
and  apparently  unbroken  uniformity  of  Law,  until  the  Universe  becomes 
to  him  but  the  result  mechanically  evolved  from  tendencies  at  once 
irreversible  and  self -originated.  To  us  such  a  conception  is  wholly 
inconceivable.  Law  to  us  involves  the  necessity  of  postulating  a  Law- 
giver, and  "  Nature,"  which  we  only  use  as  an  unscientific  and  imagi- 
native synonym  for  the  sum  total  of  observed  phenomena,  involves  in 
our  conceptions  the  Divine  Power  of  whose  energy  it  is  but  the  visible 
translucence.  We  believe  that  the  God  and  Creator  of  "  Nature  "  has 
made  Himself  known  to  us,  if  not  by  a  primitive  intuition,  at  any  rate 
by  immediate  revelation  to  our  hearts  and  consciences.  And  therefore 
such  narratives  as  those  to  which  I  have  alluded  are  not  nakedly  and 
singly  presented  to  us  in  all  their  unsupported  and  startling  difficulty. 
To  us  they  are  but  incidental  items  in  a  faith  which  lies  at  the  very 
bases  of  our  being — they  are  but  fragments  of  that  great  whole  which 
comprises  all  that  is  divine  and  mysterious  and  supernatural  in  the 
two  great  words,  Christianity  and  Christendom.  And  hence,  though 
we  no  longer  prominently  urge  the  miracles  of  Christ  as  the  proofs  of 
our  religion,  yet,  on  the  other  hand,  we  cannot  regard  them  as 
stumbling-blocks  in  the  path  of  an  historical  belief.  We  study  the 
sacred  books  of  all  the  great  religions  of  the  world ;  we  see  the  effect 
exercised  by  those  religions  on  the  minds  of  their  votaries ;  and  in 
spite  of  all  the  truths  which  even  the  worst  of  them  enshrined,  we 
watch  the  failure  of  them  all  to  produce  the  inestimable  blessings 
which  we  have  ourselves  enjoyed  from  infancy,  which  we  treasure  as 
dearly  as  our  life,  and  which  we  regard  as  solely  due  to  the  spread  and 
establishment  of  the  faith  we  hold.  We  read  the  systems  and  treatises 
of  ancient  philosophy,  and  in  spite  of  all  the  great  and  noble  elements 
in  which  they  abound,  we  see  their  total  incapacity  to  console,  or 
support,  or  deliver,  or  regenerate  the  world.  Then  we  see  the  light  of 


X  PREFACE. 

Christianity  dawning  like  a  tender  day-spring  amid  the  universal  and 
intolerable  darkness.  From  the  first,  that  new  religion  allies  itself  with 
the  world's  ntter  feeblenesses,  and  those  feeblenesses  it  shares ;  yet 
without  wealth,  without  learning,  without  genius,  without  arms,  with- 
out anything  to  dazzle  and  attract — the  religion  of  outcasts  and  exiles, 
of  fugitives  and  prisoners — numbering  among  its  earliest  converts  not 
many  wise,  not  many  noble,  not  many  mighty,  but  such  as  the  gaoler 
of  Philippi,  and  the  runaway  slave  of  Colossee — with  no  blessing  appa- 
rently upon  it  save  such  as  cometh  from  above — with  no  light  what- 
ever about  it  save  the  light  that  comes  from  heaven — it  puts  to  flight 
kings  and  their  armies  ;  it  breathes  a  new  life,  and  a  new  hope,  and  a 
new  and  unknown  holiness  into  a  guilty  and  decrepit  world.  This  we 
see ;  and  we  see  the  work  grow,  and  increase,  and  become  more  and 
more  irresistible,  and  spread  "  with  the  gentleness  of  a  sea  that 
caresses  the  shore  it  covers."  And  seeing  this,  we  recall  the  faithful 
principle  of  the  wise  and  tolerant  Rabbi,  uttered  more  than  1,800  years 
ago — "  If  this  counsel  or  this  work  be  of  men,  it  will  come  to  nought ; 
but  if  it  be  of  God,  ye  cannot  overthrow  it,  lest  haply  ye  be  found  to 
fight  against  God  "  (Acts  v.  38,  39). 

And  when  we  have  thus  been  led  to  see  and  to  believe  that  the  only 
religion  in  the  world  which  has  established  the  ideal  of  a  perfect 
holiness,  and  rendered  common  the  attainment  of  that  ideal,  has 
received  in  conspicuous  measure  the  blessing  of  God,  we  examine 
its  truths  with  a  deeper  reverence.  The  record  of  these  truths — the 
record  of  that  teaching  which  made  them  familiar  to  the  world — we 
find  in  the  Gospel  narrative.  And  that  narrative  reveals  to  us  much 
more.  It  not  only  furnishes  us  with  an  adequate  reason  for  the  exist- 
ence and  for  the  triumphs  of  the  faith  we  hold,  but  it  also  brings  home 
to  us  truths  which  affect  our  hearts  and  intellects  no  less  powerfully 
than  "the  starry  heavens  above  and  the  moral  law  within."  Taught 
to  regard  ourselves  as  children  of  God,  and  common  brothers  in  His 
great  family  of  man,  we  find  in  the  Gospels  a  revelation  of  God  in  His 
Son,  which  enables  us  to  know  Him  more,  and  to  trust  Him  more 
absolutely,  and  to  serve  Him  more  faithfully,  than  all  which  we  can 
find  in  all  the  other  books  of  God,  whether  in  Scripture,  or  history, 
or  tho  experience  of  life,  or  those  unseen  messages  which  God  has 
written  on  every  individual  heart.  And  finding  that  this  revela- 
;  tion  has  been  recorded  by  honest  men  in  narratives  which,  however 
fragmentary,  appear  to  stand  the  test  of  history,  and  to  bear  on  the 


PREFACE.  XI 

face  of  them  every  mark  of  transparent  simplicity  and  perfect  truth- 
fulness— prepared  for  the  reception  of  these  glad  tidings  of  God's  love 
in  man's  redemption  by  the  facts  of  the  world  -without,  and  the  expe- 
riences of  the  heart  within — we  thus  cease  to  find  any  overwhelming 
difficulty  in  the  record  that  He  whom  we  believe  to  have  been  the  Son 
of  God — He  who  alone  has  displayed  on  earth  the  transcendent  miracle 
of  a  sinless  life — should  have  walked  on  the  Sea  of  Galilee  or  turned 
the  water  into  wine. 

And  when  we  thus  accept  the  truth  of  the  miracles  they  become  to 
us  moral  lessons  of  the  profoundest  value.  In  considering  the  miracles 
of  Jesus  we  stand  in  a  wholly  different  position  to  the  earlier  disciples. 
To  them  the  evidence  of  the  miracles  lent  an  overwhelming  force  to 
the  teachings  of  the  Lord;  they  were  as  the  seal  of  God  to  the 
proclamation  of  the  new  kingdom.  But  to  us  who,  for  nineteen 
centuries,  have  been  children  of  that  kingdom,  such  evidence  is 
needless.  To  the  Apostles  they  were  the  credentials  of  Christ's 
mission ;  to  us  they  are  but  fresh  revelations  of  His  will.  To  us 
they  are  works  rather  than  signs,  revelations  rather  than  portents. 
Their  historical  importance  lies  for  us  in  the  fact  that  without  them 
it  would  be  impossible  to  account  for  the  origin  and  spread  of  Chris- 
tianity. We  appeal  to  them  not  to  prove  the  truth  of  Christianity,  but 
to  illustrate  its  dissemination.  But  though  to  us  Christianity  rests  on 
the  basis  of  a  Divine  approval  far  more  convincing  than  the  display  of 
supernatural  power — though  to  us  the  providence  which  for  these  two 
millenniums  has  ruled  the  destinies  of  Christendom  is  a  miracle  far 
more  stupendous  in  its  evidential  force  than  the  raising  of  the  dead  or 
the  enlightenment  of  the  blind — yet  a  belief  in  these  miracles  enables 
ns  to  solve  problems  which  would  otherwise  be  insolvable,  as  well  as 
to  embrace  moral  conceptions  which  would  otherwise  have  found  no 
illustration.  To  one  who  rejects  them — to  one  who  believes  that  the 
loftiest  morals  and  the  divinest  piety  which  mankind  has  ever  seen 
were  evoked  by  a  religion  which  rested  on  errors  or  on  lies — the 
world's  history  must  remain,  it  seems  to  me,  a  hopeless  enigma  or  a 
revolting  fraud. 

6.  Referring  to  another  part  of  the  subject,  I  ought  to  say  I  do  not 
regard  as  possible  any  final  harmony  of  the  Gospels.  Against  any 
harmony  which  can  bo  devised  some  plausible  objection  could  bo 
urged.  On  this  subject  no  two  writers  have  ever  been  exactly  agreed, 
and  this  alone  is  sufficient  to  prove  that  the  Gospel  notices  of  chro- 


Xll  PREFACE. 

nology  are  too  incomplete  to  render  certainty  attainable.  I  have,  of 
course,  touched  directly,  as  well  as  indirectly,  on  such  questions  as  the 
length  of  the  ministry ;  and  wherever  the  narrative  required  some 
clear  and  strong  reason  for  adopting  one  view  rather  than  another  on 
some  highly  disputed  point,  I  have  treated  the  question  as  fully  as 
was  consistent  with  brevity,  and  endeavoured  to  put  the  reader  in 
possession  of  the  main  facts  and  arguments  on  which  the  decision 
rests.  But  it  would  have  been  equally  unprofitable  and  idle  to 
encumber  my  pages  with  endless  controversy  on  collateral  topics 
which,  besides  being  dreary  and  needless,  are  such  as  admit  of  no  final 
settlement.  In  deciding  upon  a  particular  sequence  of  events,  we  can 
only  say  that  such  a  sequence  appears  to  us  a  probable  one,  not  by 
any  means  that  we  regard  it  as  certain.  In  every  instance  I  have 
carefully  examined  the  evidence  for  myself,  often  compressing  into  a 
few  lines,  or  even  into  an  incidental  allusion,  the  results  of  a  long 
enquiry.  To  some  extent  I  agree  with  Stier  and  Lange  in  the  order 
of  events  which  they  have  adopted,  and  in  this  respect,  as  well  as  for 
my  first  insight  into  the  character  of  several  scenes,  I  am  perhaps 
more  indebted  to  the  elaborate  work  of  Lange  than  to  any  others  who 
have  written  on  the  same  subject.  When  an  author  is  writing  from 
the  results  of  independent  thought  on  the  sum  total  of  impressions 
formed  during  a  course  of  study,  it  is  not  always  possible  to  acknow- 
ledge specific  obligations  ;  but  whenever  I  was  consciously  indebted  to 
others,  I  have,  throughout  the  book,  referred  especially  to  Ewald, 
Neander,  Schenkel,  Strauss,  Hase,  Sepp,  Stier,  Ebrard,  Wieseler, 
Hofmann,  Keim,  Caspari,  Ullmann,  Delitzsch,  De  Pressense.  Wallon, 
Dupanlonp,  Capecelatro,  Ellicott,  Young,  Andrews,  Wordsworth, 
Alford,  and  many  others;  as  well  as  to  older  writers  like  BSjna-; 
ven^ura  and  Jeremy  Taylor.  I  have  also  to  acknowledge  the  assist- 
ance which  I  have  gained  from  the  writings  of  Dean  Stanley,  Canons 
Lightfoot  and  Westcott,  Professor  Plumptre,  Dr.  Ginsburg,  Mr.  Grove, 
find  the  authors  of  articles  in  the  Encyclopaedias  of  Ersch  and  Grube, 
I  lerzog,  Zeller,  Winer,  and  Dr.  W.  Smith.  Incidental  lights  have  of 
course  been  caught  from  various  archaeological  treatises,  as  well  a* 
works  of  geography  and  travel,  from  the  old  Itineraries  and  Reland 
down  to  Dr.  Thomson's  Land  and  JBoofc,  and  Mr.  Hepworth  Dixon'a 
Holy  Land. 

7.  It  is  needless  to  add  that  this  book  is  almost  wholly  founded  on 
an  independent  study  of  the  four  Gospels  side  by  side.     In  quoting 


PREFACE.  xiii 

from  them  I  have  constantly  and  intentionally  diverged  from  the 
English  version,  because  my  main  object  has  been  to  bring  out  and 
explain  the  scenes  as  they  are  described  by  the  original  witnesses. 
The  minuter  details  of  those  scenes,  and  therewith  the  accuracy  of  our 
reproduction  of  them,  depend  in  no  small  degree  upon  the  discovery 
of  the  true  reading,  and  the  delicate  observance  of  the  true  usage  of 
words,  particles,  and  tenses.  It  must  not  be  supposed  for  a  moment 
that  I  offer  these  translations — which  are  not  uufrequently  paraphrases 
— as  preferable  to  those  of  the  English  version,  but  only  that,  con- 
sistently with  the  objects  which  I  had  in  view,  I  have  aimed  at  repre- 
senting with  more  rigid  accuracy  the  force  and  meaning  of  the  true 
text  in  the  original  Greek.  It  will  be  noticed  that  in  most  of  my 
quotations  from  the  Gospels  I  do  not  slavishly  follow  the  English 
version,  but  translate  from  the  original  Greek.  It  will  be  seen  too 
that  I  have  endeavoured  to  glean  in  illustration  all  that  is  valuable  or 
trustworthy  in  Josephus,  in  the  Apocryphal  Gospels,  and  in  traditional 
particulars  derived  from  the  writings  of  the  Fathers. 

8.  Some  readers  will  perhaps  be  surprised  by  the  frequency  of  the 
allusions  to  Jewish  literature.  Without  embarking  on  "  the  sea  of  the 
Talmud "  (as  the  Rabbis  themselves  call  it) — a  task  which  would 
require  a  lifetime — a  modern  reader  may  find  not  only  the  amplest 
materials,  but  probably  all  the  materials  it  can  offer  for  the  illustration 
of  the  Gospel  history,  in  the  writings  not  of  Christians  only,  but  also 
of  learned  and  candid  Rabbis.  Not  only  in  the  well-known  treatises  of 
Lightfoot,  Schottgen,  Surenhuys,  Wagenseil,  Buxtorf,  Otho,  Reland, 
Budzeus,  Gfrorer,  Herzfeld,  McCaul,  Etheridge,  but  also  in  those  of 
Jews  by  birth  or  religion,  or  both,  like  Geiger,  Jost,  Gratz,  Derenbourg, 
Munk,  Frankl,  Deutsch,  Raphall,  Schwab,  Cohen,  any  one  may  find 
large  quotations  from  the  original  authorities  collected  as  well  by 
adversaries  as  by  reverent  and  admiring  students.  Further,  he  may 
read  the  entire  Mishna  (if  he  have  the  time  and  patience  to  do  so)  in 
the  Latin  version  of  Surenhnsius,  and  may  now  form  his  judgment 
respecting  large  and  important  treatises  even  of  the  Gemara,  from  such 
translations  as  the  French  one  of  the  Berachoth  by  M.  Mo'ise  Schwab. 
I  have  myself  consulted  all  the  authorities  here  named,  and  have 
gained  from  them  much  information  which  seems  to  me  eminently 
useful.  Their  researches  have  thrown  a  flood  of  light  on  some  parts 
of  the  Gospels,  and  have  led  me  to  some  conclusions  which,  so  far  as  I 
am  aware,  are  new.  Nothing  of  the  slightest  importance  can  be 


XIV  PREFACE. 

gleaned  from  the  Talmudists  about  our  Lord  Himself.  The  real 
value  of  the  Rabbinic  writings  in  illustrating  the  Gospels  is  indirect, 
not  direct — archaeological,  not  controversial.  The  light  which  they 
throw  on  the  fidelity  of  the  Evangelists  is  all  the  more  valuable 
because  it  is  derived  from  a  source  so  unsuspected  and  so  hostile. 

9.  If  in  any  part  of  this  book  I  have  appeared  to  sin  against  the 
divine  law  of  charity,  I  must  here  ask  pardon  for  it.  But  at  least  I 
may  say  that  whatever  trace  of  asperity  may  be  found  in  any  page  of 
it,  has  never  been  directed  against  men,  but  against  principles,  or  only 
against  those  men  or  classes  of  men  in  long-past  ages  whom  we  solely 
regard  as  the  representatives  of  principles.  It  is  possible  that  this 
book  may  fall  into  the  hands  of  some  Jewish  readers,  and  to  these 
particularly  I  would  wish  this  remark  to  be  addressed.  I  have  reason 
to  believe  that  the  Jewish  race  have  long  since  learnt  to  look  with  love 
and  reverence  on  Him  whom  their  fathers  rejected;  nay,  more,  that 
many  of  them,  convinced  by  the  irrefragable  logic  of  history,  have 
openly  acknowledged  that  He  was  indeed  their  promised  Messiah, 
although  they  still  reject  the  belief  in  His  divinity.  I  see,  in  the 
writings  of  many  Jews,  a  clear  conviction  that  Jesus,  to  whom  they 
have  quite  ceased  to  apply  the  terms  of  hatred  found  in  the  Talmud, 
was  at  any  rate  the  greatest  religious  Teacher,  the  highest  and  noblest 
Prophet  whom  their  race  produced.  They,  therefore,  would  be  the 
last  to  defend  that  greatest  crime  in  history — the  Crucifixion  of  the 
Son  of  God.  And  while  no  Christian  ever  dreams  of  visiting  upon 
them  the  horror  due  to  the  sin  of  their  ancestors,  so  no  Jew  will 
charge  the  Christians  of  to-day  with  looking  with  any  feeling  but 
that  of  simple  abhorrence  on  the  long,  cruel,  and  infamous  persecu- 
tions to  which  the  ignorance  and  brutality  of  past  ages  have  subjected 
their  great  and  noble  race.  We  may  humbly  believe  that  the  day  is 
fast  approaching  when  He  whom  the  Jews  crucified,  and  whose  divine 
revelations  the  Christians  have  BO  often  and  BO  grievously  disgraced, 
will  break  down  the  middle  wall  of  partition  between  them,  and  make 
both  races  one  in  religion,  in  heart,  and  life — Semite  and  Aryan,  Jew 
and  Gentile,  united  to  bless  and  to  evangelise  the  world. 

10.  One  task  alone  remains — the  pleasant  task  of  thanking  those 
friends  to  whose  ready  aid  and  sympathy  I  owe  BO  much,  and  who 
have  Burrounded  with  happy  memories  and  obligations  the  completion 
of  my  work.  First  and  foremost,  my  heartiest  and  sincerest  thanks 
are  due  to  my  friends,  Mr.  C.  J.  Monro,  late  Fellow  of  Trinity  College, 


PEEFACE.  It 

Cambridge,  and  Mr.  R.  Garnett,  of  the  British  Museum.  They  have 
given  me  an  amount  of  time  and  attention  which  leaves  me  most 
largely  indebted  to  their  unselfish  generosity ;  and  I  have  made  claims 
on  their  indulgence  more  extensive  than  I  can  adequately  repay.  .To 
my  old  pupil,  Mr.  H.  J.  Boyd,  late  scholar  of  Brasenose  College, 
Oxford,  I  am  indebted  for  the  Table  of  Contents.  I  have  also  to 
thank  the  Rev.  Professor  Plumptre  and  Mr.  George  Grove  not  only 
for  the  warm  interest  which  they  have  taken  in  my  work,  but  also  for 
some  valuable  suggestions.  There  are  many  others,  not  here  named, 
who  will  believe,  without  any  assurance  from  me,  that  I  am  not 
ungrateful  for  the  help  which  they  have  rendered ;  and  I  must  espe- 
cially offer  my  best  acknowledgments  to  the  Rev.  T.  Teignmouth 
Shore — but  for  whose  kind  encouragement  the  book  would  not  have 
been  undertaken — and  to  those  who  with  so  much  care  and  patience 
have  conducted  it  through  the  press. 

And  now  I  send  these  pages  forth  not  knowing  what  shall  befall 
them,  but  with  the  earnest  prayer  that  they  may  be  blessed  to  aid  the 
cause  of  truth  and  righteousness,  and  that  He  in  whose  name  they  are 
written  may,  of  His  mercy, 


"  Forgive  them  where  they  fail  in  truth, 
And  in  His  wisdom  make  me  wise." 


F.  W.  F. 


THE  LODGE,  MARLBOROUGH  COLLEGE, 

Monday  before  Easter,  1374. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  I. 
THE    NATIVITY. 

Tho  Fields  of  the  Shepherds. — An  Eastern  Khan. — The  Cave  of  Bethlehem. 
— The  Enrolment. — Joseph  and  Mary. — "No  room  for  them  in  the 
inn." — The  Manger  and  the  Palace. — The  Nativity. — Adoration  of 
the  Shepherds. — Fancy  and  Reality. — Contrast  of  the  Gospels  and  the 
Apocrypha  .1 

CHAPTER  H. 
THE  PRESENTATION  IN  THE  TEMPLE. 

Four  Circumstances  of  the  Infancy. — Order  of  Events. — The  Circumcision. — 
The  name  Jesus. — The  Presentation  in  the  Temple. — Simeon. — Anna  .  7 

CHAPTER  III. 
THE  VISIT  OP  THE  MAGI. 

Importance  of  the  Epiphany. — Herod  the  Great. — "  Magi." — Traditions. — 
Causes  of  their  Journey. — General  Expectation  of  the  World. — The 
Star  in  the  East. — Astronomical  Conjectures  of  Kepler,  &c. — Evanescent 
Stars.— Gifts  of  the  Magi 10 

CHAPTER   IV. 
THE  FLIGHT  INTO  EGYPT,  AND  MASSACEE  OF  THE  INNOCENTS. 

Departure  of  the  Magi. — Legends  of  the  Flight  into  Egypt. — Massacre  of 
the  Innocents. — Its  Historical  Credibility. — Character  of  Herod  the 
Groat. — Silence  of  Josephus. — Death  and  Burial  of  Herod  the  Great. — 
The  Spell  of  the  Herodian  Dominion  broken. — Accession  of  Archelaus. 
— Settlement  of  Joseph  and  Mary  in  Galilee 16 

CHAPTER   V. 
THE  BOYHOOD  OF  JESUS. 

Geography  of  Palestine. — Galilee. — Nazareth. — Reticence  of  the  Evangelists. 
— Truthfulness  of  the  Gospels  contrasted  with  Apocryphal  Legends. 
— Life  of  Galilsean  Peasants. — Imagination  and  Fact. — "He  shall  be 
called  a  Nazarene "  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .-,••-•  22 

*    » 


XV111  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER   VI. 

JESUS  IN  THE  TEMPLE. 

Jesus  Twelve  Tears  old. — Journey  from  Nazareth  to  Jerusalem. — Scenes  by 

the  Way. — Numbers  of  Passover  Pilgrims. — Jesus  missing  from  the 

Caravan. — The  Search. — Rabbis  in  the  Temple. — "Hearing  them  and 

asking  them  questions." — "  Why  did  ye  seek  Me  ?  " — "  They  understood 

not." — Submissiveness 30 

CHAPTER  VH. 
THE  HOME  AT  NAZABETH. 

"The  Carpenter." — Dignity  of  Poverty. — Dignity  of  Toil. — The  Common 
Lot. — Wisdom  better  than  Knowledge. — Originality. — The  Language 
spoken  by  Jesus. — The  Books  of  God. — Jesus  in  Hi  a  Home. — Work 
and  Example  of  those  Years. — Peacefulness. — "The  brethren  of  the 
Lord." — Solitude — The  Hill-top  at  Nazareth. — Plain  of  Esdraelon. — 
Centrality  of  Palestine .37 

CHAPTER  YELL 
THE  BAPTISM  or  JOHN. 

Characteristics  of  the  Age. — Darkness  deepest  before  Dawn. — Asceticism.— 
John  the  Baptist. — Hia  Character. — His  Teaching. — His  Audience. — 
Scene  of  his  Teaching — His  Message. — Bearing  of  John  in  the 
Presence  of  Jesus. — Why  Jesus  was  baptised. — Recognition  as  the 
Messiah 48 

CHAPTER  IX. 
THE  TEMPTATION. 

Quarantania. — "With  the  wild' beasts." — "Forty  days." — The  Moment  of 
Exhaustion. — Reality  of  the  Temptation. — "  Tempted  like  as  we  are." 
— Fasting. — Xapides  Judaici. — The  First  Temptation. — Subtlety  of  it. — 
"Not  by  bread  alone." — The  Suggested  Doubt. — The  Order  of  the 
Temptations. — The  Temple  Pinnacle. — The  Tempter's  Quotation. — 
The  Splendid  Offer. — The  Roman  Emperor. — The  Victory  .  .  .54 

CHAPTER  X. 
THE  FTBST  APOSTLES. 

St.  John's  Gospel. — "  The  Lamb  of  God." — Andrew  and  John. — Simon. — 
Appearance  and  Personal  Ascendancy  of  Jesus. — Philip. — Nathanael. 
— "  Come  and  see." — "  Under  the  fig-tree." — "Angels  ascending  and 
descending" 65 

CHAPTER  XI. 
THE  FIRST  MIRACLH. 

"  On  the  third  day." — An  Eastern  Bridal. — "  They  have  no  wine." — The 
Answer  to  the  Virgin. — The  Miracle. — Characteristics  of  this  and  other 
Miracles 74 


CONTENTS.  ill 

CHAPTER  XII. 

THE  SCENE  OP  THE  MINISTRY.  PASI 

Contrast  b  tween  the  Sea  of  Galilee  and  the  Jordan  Valley.  —  Beauty  of 
Gennesareth.  —  Character  of  the  Scenery.  —  Its  Present  Desolation  and 
Past  Populousness.  —  Prophecy  of  Isaiah.  —  Centrality.  —  Christ's 
Teaching  there.  —  Site  of  Capernaum  .....  .80 


CHAPTER 
JESTTS  AT  THE  PASSOVER. 

Visit  to  Jerusalem.  —  Purification  of  the  Temple.  —  State  of  the  Court  of  the 
Gentiles.  —  Crowd  of  Traders.  —  Indignation  of  Jesus.  —  Why  they  did 
not  dare  to  resist.  —  Question  of  the  Rulers.  —  "  Destroy  this  temple."  — 
Impression  made  by  the  Words.  —  Their  deep  Significance.  —  Extent  to 
•which  they  were  understood  .......  85 

CHAPTER  XIV. 

NlCODEMTTS. 

Talmcdic  Allusions  to  Nicodemus.  —  His  Character.  —  Indirectness  of  hi* 
Questions  —  Discourse  of  Jesus.  —  His  Disciples  baptise.  —  Continued 
Baptism  of  John.  —  .ZEnon,  near  Salim.  —  Complaint  of  John's  Disciples. 

—  Noble  and  sad  Reply        .         ..         ......      01 

CHAPTER  XV. 
THE  WOMAN  OP  SAMARIA. 

Retirement  of  Jesus  to  Galilee.  —  Sychar.  —  Noontide  at  the  Well.  —  The 
Scene.  —  Conversation  with  the  Woman.  —  Jerusalem  and  Gerizim.  — 
Revelation  of  Messiahship.  —  Return  of  Disciples.  —  The  Fields  White 
unto  Harvest.  —  Believing  Samaritans  .......  95 

CHAPTER  XVI. 

REJECTED  BY  THE  NAZARENES. 

Sequence  of  Events.  —  A  perfect  "  Harmony  "  impossible.  —  A  Prophet  in 
his  own  Country.  —  A  Jewish  Synagogue.  —  Nature  of  the  Sen-ice.  — 
Sermon  of  Jesus.  —  Change  of  Feeling  in  the  Audience.  —  Their  Fury.  — 
Escape  of  Jesus.  —  Finally  leaves  Nazareth  .....  100 

CHAPTER  XVH. 

THE  BEGINNING  OP  THE  GALII^EAN  MINISTRY. 
The  Courtier's  Entreaty.  —  His  Faith.  —  Sequence  of  Events.—  St.  John  and 
the  Synoptists.  —  Jesus  stays  at  Capernaum.  —  His  First  Sabbath  there. 

—  Preaches  in  the  Synagogue.  —  The  Demoniac.  —  Peter's  Mother-in- 
law.  —  The  Evening  —  Eagerness  of  the  Multitude.  —  His  Privacy 
invaded.  —  Preaches  from  the  Boat.  —  Call  of  Peter,  James,  and  John.  — 

"  Depart  from  Me."—  Publicans.—  The  Publican  Apostle      ...     106 


XX  CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER 

THE  TWELVE,  AND  THE  SERMON  ON  THE  MOUNT.  FAO» 
A  Night  of  Prayer.  —  Selection  of  the  Twelve.  —  Conjectures  respecting 
them.  —  James  and  John.  —  Peter.  —  Kurn  Hattin.  —  Contrast  with  Moses 
on  Sinai.  —  Beatitudes.  —  Sketch  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  —  "  Not 
as  the  Scribes."  —  Authority.  —  Christ  and  other  Masters.  —  Perfection.  — 
Beauty  and  Simplicity  ......  '.  115 

CHAPTER  XIX. 
FURTHER  MIRACLES. 

A  Man  full  of  Leprosy.  —  Violation  of  the  Letter.  —  Why  was  Publicity 
forbidden?  —  Deputation  of  Batlanim.  —  Message  of  the  Centurion.  — 
Pressure  of  the  Ministry.  —  The  Interfering  Kinsmen  .  .  .  .124 

CHAPTER  XX. 
JESUS   AT   NAIN. 

Nain.  —  A  Funeral.  —  The  Widow's  Son  raised.  —  Message  from  John 
the  Baptist.  —  Overclouding  of  his  Faith.  —  How  accounted  for.  — 
Machaerus.  —  God's  Trial  of  His  Servants.  —  Answer  of  Jesus.  — 
Splendid  Eulogy  of  John.  —  "  The  least  in  the  kingdom  of  heaven"  .  129 

CHAPTER  XXI. 

THE  SINNER  AND  THE  PHARISEE. 

Simon  the  Pharisee.  —  Jewish  Customs  at  Meals.  —  The  Weeping  Woman.  — 
.  Simon's  Disgust.  —  Answer  of  Jesus.  —  Parable  of  the  Debtors.  —  Cold 
Courtesy  of  Simon.  —  Pardoning  of  Sins.  —  Was  it  Mary  of  Magdala  ?   .     136 

CHAPTER  XXII. 

JESUS  AS  HE  LIVED  IN  GALILEE. 
A  Scene  in  Galilee.  —  Jesus  and  His  Followers.  —  His  Aspect.  —  A  Life  of 

Poverty  —  of  Toil  —  of  Health—  of  Sorrow  —  and  yet  of  Holy  Joy  .        .     142 

CHAPTER  XXIII. 

A  GREAT  DAY  IN  THE  LIFE  OF  JESUS. 

Order  of  Events.  —  Teaching  from  the  Boat.  —  Parables.  —  Parable  of  tho 
Sower.  —  Other  Parables.  —  Effect  produced.  —  Urgent  Desire  for  Rest.  — 
The  Eastern  Shore.—  Tho  Three  Aspirants.—  The  Storm.—  "What 
manner  of  Man  is  this  ?  "  —  Miracles.  —  Gergesa.  —  The  Naked  Demoniac 
from  the  Tombs.  —  "  Thy  name."  —  Loss  of  the  Swine.  —  Alarm  of  tho 
Gadarcnes.  —  Their  Request.  —  Request  of  tho  Demoniac  .  .  .  148 

CHAPTER  XXIV. 
THE  DAY  OF  MATTHEW'S  FEAST. 

Bcturn  to  Capernaum.  —  The  Paralytic  lat  through  the  Roof.  —  "  Thy  sins  bo 
forgiven  thee."  —  Feast  in  Matthew's  House.  —  Scorn  of  tho  Pharisees. 
—  Question  about  Fasting.  —  The  New  Wine  and  the  Old  .  .  .  159 


CONTENTS.  Ui 

CHAPTER  XXV. 

THE  DAT  OF  MATTHEW'S  FEAST  (continued).  PAG« 

Jairus.  —  The  "Woman  with  the  Issue.  —  The  Touch  of  Faith.  —  Message  to 
Jairus.  —  The  Hired  Mourners.  —  Eaising  of  Jairus'  s  Daughter.  —  The 
Blind  Men.  —  They  disobey  Christ's  Injunction  .....  16S 

CHAPTER  XXVI. 
A  VISIT  TO  JERUSALEM. 

Phases  of  the  Ministry.  —  Mission  of  the  Twelve.  —  Their  Instructions.  —  A 
Feast  of  the  Jews.  —  Arrangement  of  St.  John.  —  Days  of  Jewish 
Feasts.  —  Nature  of  the  Purim  Feast.  —  Reason  for  Christ's  Presence  .  167 

CHAPTER  XXVII. 
THE  MIRACLE  AT  BETHESDA. 

Pool  of  Bethesda.  —  Healing  of  the  Impotent  Man.  —  Jealous  Questioning.  — 
Sabbath-breaking.  —  The  Man's  Meanness.  —  Anger  of  the  Rulers.— 
Answer  of  Jesus.  —  Dangerous  Results  .  .  .  .  .  .  .172 

CHAPTER  XXVin. 

THE  MURDER  OF  JOHN  THE  BAPTIST. 

Return  to  Galilee.  —  Herod  Antipas.  —  Herodias.  —  Consequences  of  the 
Adulterous  Marriage.  —  Credulity  and  Unbelief.  —  The  Banquet.  — 
Salome.  —  Her  Request.  —  Murder  of  the  Baptist.  —  Herod's  Remorse.  — 
He  inquires  about  Jesus.  —  Ultimate  Fate  of  Herod  .  .  .  .179 

CHAPTER  XXIX. 
THE  FEEDING  OF  THE  FIVE  THOUSAND,  AND  WALKING  ON 

THE  SEA. 

Bethsaida  Julias.  —  Hungry  Multitude.  —  Miracle  of  the  Loaves.  —  Excite- 
ment of  the  Multitude.  —  Dismissal  of  the  Disciples.  —  Jesus  alone  on 
the  Mountain.  —  The  Disciples  alone  in  the  Storm.  —  "  Itia  I."  —  Peter's 
Boldness  and  Failure.  —  Nature  of  the  Miracle  .....  186 


CHAPTER 
THE  DISCOURSE  AT  CAPERNAUM. 

Astonished  Query  of  the  Multitude.  —  Reproof  of  Jesus.  —  They  ask  for  a 
Sign.  —  His  Answer.  —  The  Bread  of  Life.  —  Their  Dull  Materialism.  — 
Their  Displeasure.  —  Abandonment  of  Jesus.  —  Sad  Question  to  the  Dis- 
ciples. —  Answer  of  Peter.  —  Warning  to  Judas  .....  192 

CHAPTER  XXXI. 
GATHERING  OPPOSITION. 

Gathering  Clouds.  —  1.  "Thy  sins  be  forgiven  thee."  2.  "A  gluttonous 
man  and  a  winebibber."  3.  "Thy  disciples  fast  not."  4.  "With 


XXU  CONTENTS. 

FAQB 

publicans  and  sinners." — "  Mercy,  not  sacrifice." — The  Prodigal  Son. — 
Religionism  and  Religion. — 5.  Charges  of  violating  the  Sabbath. — 
Jewish  Traditions. — Abhdth  and  Toldoth. — i.  In  the  Corn-fields. — 
Analogy  of  David's  Conduct. — "No  Sabbatism  in  the  Temple." — 
Incident  in  the  Codex  Bezae. — ii.  The  Stonemason  with  the  Withered 
Hand.— Good  or  Evil  on  the  Sabbath?— The  Objectors  foiled.— 
TTnwashen  Hands.  —  Jewish  Ablutions.  —  "  Tour  tradition."  —  The 
Oral  Law.  —  Hagadoth  and  Halachdth.  —  "That  which  cometh  from 
within."— Evil  Thoughts 198 

CHAPTER  XXXH. 
DEEPENING  OPPOSITION. 

Agitations  of  the  Life  of  Jesus. — Prayer  at  Dawn. — The  Lord's  Prayer. — 
Parable  of  the  Importunate  Friend. — Lights  and  Shadows  of  the  Life 
of  Jesus. — The  Blind  and  Dumb  Demoniac. — Exorcism. — Slander  of 
the  Scribes. — Beelzebub. — Answer  of  Jesus. — Warning  against  Light 
Words. — Who  are  truly  blessed? — "  Master,  we  would  see  a  sign." — 
Sign  of  the  Prophet  Jonah. — Interference  of  His  Kinsmen  .  .  .212 

CHAPTER  XXXIIL 
THE  DAY  OF  CONFLICT. 

Alone  with  Pharisees  at  the  Midday  Meal. — Unwashen  Hands. — Reproof 
of  Jesus. — The  Lawyers  included  in  the  Reproof. — Spurious  Civility. 
— Open  Rupture. — Danger  of  Jesus. — He  goes  out  to  the  Multitude. — 
Denunciation  of  Hypocrisy. — Foolish  Appeal. — The  Parable  of  tho 
Rich  Fool. — Peter's  Question. — Jesus  troubled  in  Spirit  .  .  .219 

CHAPTER  XXXTV. 
AMONG  THE  HEATHEN. 

The   Regions  of  Tyre  and  Sidon. — The   Syro-phoenician  Woman. — Her 
Petition  apparently  rejected. — Her   Exalted   Faith. — Her  Faith  re- 
warded.— Heathen  Lands. — Return  to  Decapolis. — Deaf  and  Dumb 
Man. — "  Ephphatha !" — Reception  by  the  Multitudes. — Feeding  of  the  ' 
Four  Thousand  .  225 

CHAPTER  XXXV. 
THE  GBEAT  CONFESSION. 

Reception  of  Jesus  on  TTi«  return  to  Galilee. — An  ill-omened  Conjunc- 
tion.— Demand  of  a  Sign. — Reproof  and  Refusal. — Sadness  of  Jesus. — 
He  sails  away. — The  Prophetic  Woe. — Leaven  of  the  Pharisees  and 
of  Herod. — Literal  Misinterpretation  of  the  Apostles. — Healing  of  a 
Blind  Man  at  Bethsaida  Julias. — On  the  road  to  Caesarea  Philippi. — 
The  momentous  Questions. — "Thou  art  the  Christ,  the  Son  of  the 
Living  God." — The  Rock. — Foundation  of  the  Church. — Misinterpra- 


CONTENTS. 

•MM 
tations. — Warnings  about  His  Death. — Rash  Presumption  of  Peter. — 

"Get  thee  behind  me,  Satan." — The  "Worth  of  the  Human  SouL — 

"  The  Son  of  Man  coming  in  His  Kingdom  " 229 

• 

CHAPTER  XXXVI. 
THE  TRANSFIGURATION. 

The  Mountain. — Not  Tabor,  but  Hermon. — The  Vision. — Moses  and  Elias. — 
Bewildered  Words  of  Peter. — The  Voice  from  Heaven. — Fading  of  the 
Vision.— The  New  Elias 241 

CHAPTER  XXXVII. 
THE    DEMONIAC    BOY. 

The  Contrast. — The  Disciples  and  the  Scribes. — Arrival  of  Jesus. — The 
Demoniac  Boy. — Emotion  of  Jesus. — Anguish  of  the  Father. — "If 
thou  canst." — The  Deliverance. — Power  of  Faith  to  remove  Moun- 
tains.— Secluded  Return  of  Jesus. — Sad  "Warnings. — Dispute  which 
should  be  the  Greatest. — The  Little  Child. — John's  Question. — Offend- 
ing Christ's  Little  Ones. — The  Unforgiving  Debtor  ....  245 

CHAPTER  XXXVTIL 
A  BBIEP  REST  IN  CAPERNAUM. 

The  Temple  Tax. — The  Collectors  come  to  Peter. — His  rash  Answer. — 
Jesus  puts  the  Question  in  its  true  light. — The  Stater  in  the  Fish's 
Mouth. — Peculiar  Characteristics  of  this  Miracle  .  .  .  249 

CHAPTER  XXXIX. 

JESUS  AT  THE  FEAST  OF  TABERNACLES. 

Observances  of  the  Feast  of  Tabernacles. — Presumption  of  the  Brethren  of 
Jesus. — "  I  go  not  up  yet  unto  this  feast." — Eager  Questions  of  the 
Multitude. — Their  differing  Opinions. — Jesus  appears  in  the  Temple. — 
His  reproachful  Question. — "Thou  hast  a  devil." — Appeal  to  His 
Works. — Indignation  of  the  Sanhedrin. — Observances  of  the  Last  Day 
of  the  Feast. — "  The  joy  of  the  drawing  of  water." — "  Rivers  of 
Living  Water." — Divided  Opinions. — "Never  man  spake  like  this 
Man." — Timid  Interpellation  of  Nicodemus. — Answering  Taunt  of  the 
Pharisees  252 


CHAPTER  XL. 

THE  WOMAN  TAKEN  IN  ADULTERY. 

Indirect  References  to  the  Narrative  in  the  following  Discourses. — Jesus 
at  the  Mount  of  Olives. — Returns  at  Dawn  to  the  Temple. — Hilarity 
of  the  Feast  of_  Tabernacles. — Immorality  of  the  Age. — The  Water 


XXIV  CONTENTS. 

gun 

of  Jealousy. — Base  Cruelty  of  the  Pharisees. — The  Woman  dragged 

into  the  Temple. — "  What  sayest  Thou  ?" — Subtlety  of  the  Assault. — 
Writing  on  the  Floor. — "Him  that  i*  without  sin  among  you." — 
Conscience-stricken. — Misery  left  alone  -with  Mercy. — "  Go,  and  sin 
no  more." — Absolute  Calmness  of  Jesus  under  all  Attacks. — Eighth 
Day  of  the  Feast.— The  great  Candelabra. — The  Light  of  the  World. — 
Agitating  Discussions  with  the  Jews. — A  Burst  of  Fury. — Jesus  leaves 
the  Temple 260 

CHAPTER  XLI. 
THE  MAN  BOEN  BLIND. 

Jewish  Notion  of  Nemesis. — "  Which  did  sin  ?" — "  Go  wash  in  the  Pool 
of  Siloam." — On  the  Sabbath  Day. — The  Man  examined  by  the  San- 
hedrin. — A  Sturdy  Nature. — Perplexity  of  the  Sanhedrists. — "We 
know  that  this  man  is  a  sinner." — Blandishments  and  Threats. — 
The  Man  excommunicated. — Jesus  and  the  Outcast. — True  and  False 
Shepherds 269 

CHAPTER  XUI. 
FAEEWELL  TO  GALILEE. 

The  Interval  between  the  Feasts  of  Tabernacles  and  Dedication. — Great 
Episode  in  St.  Luke. — Character  of  the  Episode. — Mission  of  tho 
Seventy. — News  of  the  Galileans  massacred  by  Pilate. — Teachings 
founded  on  the  Event. — Stern  Warnings. — The  Barren  Fig-tree. — The 
Pharisees'  Plot  to  hasten  His  Departure. — "  Go  and  tell  this  fox." — 
Herod  Antipas. — Jesus  sets  forth. — Farewell  to  the  Scene  of  His 
Ministry. — Fate  that  fell  on  the  Galilacans. — Jesus  exults  in  Spirit. — 
"  Come  unto  me  all  ye  that  labour.'' — Noble  Joy  ....  274 

CHAPTER  XLIH. 
INCIDENTS  OP  THE  JOURNEY. 

Possible  Routes. — The  Village  of  En-gannim.  —Churlishness  of  the  Samari- 
tans.— Passion  of  the  Sons  of  Thunder. — Gentle  Rebuke  of  Jesus. — 
Counting  the  Cost.— Peraea. — The  Ten  Lepers. — Thanklessness. — 
"Where  are  the  nine P" 2S2 

CHAPTER  XLIV. 
TEACHINGS  OF  THE  JOUENEY. 

Sabbatical  Disputes. — Foolish  Ruler  of  the  Synagogue. — Healing  of  thrj 
Bowed  Woman. — Argumentwnad  hominem. — Ignorant  Sabbatarianism. 
— Religious  Espionage. — The  Man  with  tho  Dropsy. — Question  of 
Jeeua. — Silence  of  Obstinacy. — The  Man  Healed. — Self-sufficiency  of 
the  Pharisees. — Struggles  for  Precedence. — A  Vague  Platitude. — 


CONTENTS.  XXT 

PAOB 

Parable  of  the  King's  Marriage-feast. — The  Unjust  Steward. — Avarice 
of  the  Pharisees. — Their  Sycophancy  to  Herod. — The  Rich  Man  and 
Lazarus. — "Are  there  few  that  be  saved?" — "What  must  I  do  to 
obtain  Eternal  Life  t" — The  Good  Samaritan. — Return  of  the  Seventy. 
— The  Love  of  Publicans  and  Sinners. — The  Parable  of  the  Prodigal 
Son. — Solemn  Warnings. — "Where,  Lord?" — The  Eagles  and  the 
Carcass 286 

CHAPTER  XLV. 
THE  FEAST  OF  DEDICATION. 

The  House  at  Bethany. — Martha  and  Mary. — "  The  one  thing  needful." 
— The  Feast  of  the  Dedication. — Solomon's  Porch. — Reminiscence  of 
the  Feast. — Jesus  suddenly  surrounded. — "  How  long  dost  thou  hold 
us  in  suspense?" — No  Political  Messiah. — "I  and  My  Father  are 
one." — They  aeek  to  stone  Him. — Appeal  of  Jesus  to  His  Life  and 
Works. — He  retires  to  Bethany  beyond  Jordan 300 

CHAPTER  XLVI. 
THE  LAST  STAY  IN  PER^A. 

Question  about  Divorce. — Importance  of  the  Question. — Hillel  and  Sham- 
mai. — Dispute  as  to  the  meaning  of  Ervath  Dabhar. — Lax  Interpre- 
tations.— Both  Schools  wrong. — Simple  Solution  of  the  Question. — 
Permission  of  Divorce  by  Moses  only  temporary. — Corruption  of  the 
Age. — Teachings  of  Jesus  about  Moral  Purity. — Celibacy  and  Marriage. 
— Jesus  blesses  Little  Children. — The  eager  Young  Ruler. — "  Good 
Master."— "  What  must  I  do?"— An  Heroic  Mandate.— " The  Great 
Refusal." — Discouragement  of  the  Disciples. — Hundredfold  Rewards. 
— The  Labourers  in  the  Vineyard 806 

CHAPTER  XLVII. 
THE  RAISING  OP  LAZARUS. 

Message  to  Jesus. — Two  Days'  Delay. — "  Let  us  also  go  that  we  may  die 
with  Him." — He  approaches  Bethany. — Martha  meets  Him. — "The 
Resurrection  and  the  life." — Mary's  Agony. — Deep  Emotion  of 
Jesus. — Scene  at  the  Grave. — "  Lazarus,  come  forth." — Silence  of 
the  Synoptists. — Meeting  at  the  House  of  Caiaphas. — His  Wicked 
Policy. — The  Fiat  of  Death. — Retirement  to  Ephraim  .  .  .314 

CHAPTER  XLVIII. 
JERICHO  AND  BETHANY. 

Pilgrim-caravans. — Jesus  on  His  Way. — Revelation  of  the  Crowning 
Hoiror. — The  Sons  of  Zebedee. — The  Cup  and  the  Baptism. — Humility 
before  Honour. — Jericho. — Bartimaeus. — Zacchajus. — HJH  Repentance. 
— Parable  of  the  Pounds. — Events  which  suggested  it. — Arrival  at 
Bethany. — "  Simon  the  Leper." — Intentional  Reticence  of  the  Svnop- 


CONTENTS. 

PAQ* 

tists.  —  Mary's  Offering.  —  Inward  Rage  of  Judas.  —  Blessing  of  Mary 
by  Jesus.  —  "For  my  burying."  —  Interview  of  the  Traitor  with  the 
Priests  ............  320 


CHAPTER 
PALM  SUNDAY. 

Excitement  of  Expectation.  —  Three  Roads  to  Bethany.  —  Bethphage.  — 
The  Ass's  Colt.—  A  Humble  Triumph.  —  Hosanna  !  —  Turn  of  the  Road. 

—  The  Jerusalem  of  that  Day.  —  Jesus  weeps  over  the  City.  —  Terrible 
Fulfilment  of  the  Woe.  —  The  Two  Processions.  —  Indignation  of  the 
Pharisees.  —  "  Who  is  this  ?"  —  Jesus  once  more  cleanses  the  Temple.  — 
Hosannas  of  the  Children.  —  "Have  ye  never  read?"  —  The  Greeks 
who  desired  an  Interview.  —  Abgarus  V.  —  Discourse  of  Jesus.  —  Voice 
from  Heaven.  —  The  Day  closes  in  Sadness.  —  Bivouac  on  the  Mount  of 
Olives  ....        .........    329 

CHAPTER  L. 
MONDAY  IN  PAssroN  WEEK.  —  A  DAY  OF  PARABLES. 

Jesus  Hungers.  —  The  Deceptive  Fig.  —  Hopelessly  Barren.  —  Criticisms  on 
the  Miracle.  —  Right  View  of  it.  —  Deputation  of  the  Priests.  —  "  Who 
gave  thee  this  authority?"  —  Counter-question  of  Jesus.  —  The 
Priests  reduced  to  Silence.  —  Parable  of  the  Two  Sons.  —  Parable  of 
the  Rebellious  Husbandmen.  —  The  Rejected  Corner-stone.  —  Parable  of 
the  Marriage  of  the  King's  Son.  —  Machinations  of  the  Pharisees  .  337 

CHAPTER  LI. 
THE  DAY  OP  TEMPTATIONS.  —  THE  LAST  AND  GREATEST  DAY 

OF  THE  PUBLIC  MINISTRY  OF  JESUS. 

The  Withered  Fig-tree.  —  Power  of  Faith.  —  Plot  of  the  Herodians.  —  Its 
Dangerous  Character.  —  The  Tribute  Money.  —  Divine  and  Ready 
Wisdom  of  the  Reply  of  Jesus.  —  Attempt  of  the  Sadducees.  —  A  poor 
Question  of  Casuistry.  —  The  Sevenfold  Widow.  —  "  As  the  Angels  of 
God."  —  "  The  God  of  Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob."  —  Implicit  Teaching 
of  Immortality  ..........  345 

CHAPTER  LH. 
THE  GREAT  DENUNCIATION. 

"Master,  thou  hast  well  said."  —  "Which  is  the  great  commandment?"  — 
Answer  of  the  Rabbis.  —  Answer  of  Jesus.  —  "  Not  far  from  the  king- 
dom of  heaven."  —  Question  of  Jcsua  to  the  Scribes.  —  David's  Son  and 
David's  Lord.  —  Their  Failure  to  answer.  —  The  Final  Rupture.  —  "  Woe 
unto  you,  Scribes  and  Pharisees,  hypocrites  !"  —  The  Voice  which  broke 
in  Tears.  —  "O  Jerusalem,  Jerusalem!"  —  The  Denunciation  deserved. 

—  The  Denunciation  fulfilled  .    352 


CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  LHI. 

FAREWELL  TO  THE  TEMPLE.  MOB 

A  Happier  Incident. — The  poor  Widow. — True  Almsgiving. — Splendour  of 
the  Temple. — "  Not  one  stone  upon  another."— Jesus  on  the  Mount 
of  Olives. — "When  shall  these  things  be?" — The  great  Eschatological 
Discourse. — The  Two  Horizons. — Difficulties  of  the  Discourse,  and 
mode  of  meeting  them. — What  must  come  before  the  Final  End. — 
The  Immediate  Future. — Warning  Signs. — Parable  of  the  Fig-tree — of 
the  Ten  Virgins — of  the  Talents. — After  Two  Days. — Last  Evening 
Walk  to  Bethany  .  .-.*... 258 

CHAPTER  LTV. 
THE  BEGINNING  OF  THE  END. 

Sleeting  of  Conspirators  in  the  Palace  of  Caiaphas. — Their  Discussions. — 
Judas  demands  an  Interview. — Thirty  Pieces  of  Silver. — Motives  of 
Judas. — "Satan  entered  into  Judas." — The  Wednesday  passed  in 
Retirement. — Last  Sleep  of  Jesus  on  Earth 367 

CHAPTER  LV. 
THE  LAST  SUPPEB. 

"Green  Thursday." — Preparations  for  the  Meal. — The  Upper  Room. — 
Dispute  about  Precedence. — Jesus  washes  the  Disciples'  Feet. — Peter's 
Surprise  and  Submission. — "Ye  are  clean,  but  not  all." — Teaching 
about  Humility. — Troubled  in  Spirit. — "  One  of  you  shall  betray  me." 
"  Lord,  is  it  I P  " — Peter  makes  a  sign  to  John. — Giving  of  the  Sop. — 
"  Rabbi,  is  it  I P  " — "  He  went  out,  and  it  was  night." — Revived  Joy 
of  the  Feast. — Institution  of  the  Lord's  Supper 372 

CHAPTER  LVL 
THE  LAST  DISCOURSE. 

"  Naw  is  the  Son  of  Man  glorified." — "  Little  Children." — The  New  Com- 
mandment.— "Lord,  whither  goest  Thou?" — Warning  to  Peter. — 
"  Lord,  here  are  two  swords." — Consolations. — "  How  can  we  know 
the  way?" — "Lord,  show  us  the  Father." — Difficulty  of  Judas 
Lebbaeus. — Last  Words  before  Starting. — The  True  Vine. — Plain 
Teachings. — Gratitude  of  the  Disciples. — Fresh  Warnings  to  them. — 
The  High-Priestly  Prayer  382 

CHAPTER  LVH. 
GETHSEMANE. — THE  AGONY  AND  THE  ABBEST. 

Walk  through  the  Moonlight  to  Gethsemane. — Last  Warning  to  Peter. — 
Gethsemane. — Scene  of  Agony. — Desire  for  Solitude  and  yet  for 
Sympathy. — The  First  Struggle  with  Agony  of  Soul. — Its  Intensity. — 
The  Bloody  Sweat. — Not  due  to  Dread  of  Death. — "  Simon,  sleepest 


XXVlll  CONTENTS. 

PAQI 

thou?" — The  Second  Agony. — The  Disciples  Sleeping.— The  Third 
Agony  and  Final  Victory. — "  Sleep  on  now,  and  take  your  rest." — 
Torches  in  the  Moonlight. — Steps  taken  by  Judas. — "  Comrade." — The 
Traitor's  Kiss. — Jesus  advances. — "Whom  seek  ye?" — "lam  He." 
— Terror  of  the  Band. — Historical  Parallels. — Jesus  arrested. — Peter's 
Blow. — "  Suffer  ye  thus  far." — The  Young  Man  in  the  Linen  Sheet. 
— Jesus  bound  and  led  away. 389 

CHAPTER  LVIIL 

JESUS   BEFORE  THE   PRIESTS   AND   THE   SANHEDRIN. 

Asserted  Discrepancies. — Sixfold  Trial. — "  To  Annas  first." — Hanan,  tho 
High  Priest  de  jure. — His  Character. — His  Responsibility  for  tho 
Result. — Degradation  of  the  then  Sanhedrin. — Pharisees  and  Saddu- 
cees. — Greater  Cruelty  of  the  Latter. — The  Sadducees,  the  Priestly 
Party  .—Cause  of  their  Rage  and  Hatred. — "The  Viper  Brood." — 
Jesus  repudiates  the  Examination  of  Hanan. — "  Answerest  Thou  tho 
High  Priest  so?" — Noble  Patience. — The  Second  Phase  of  the 
Trial. — In  the  Palace  of  Caiaphas. — Committees  of  the  Sanhedrin. — 
"Sought  false  witness." — Total  Failure  of  the  Witnesses. — "Destroy' 
this  Temple." — Silence  of  Jesus. — Despair  of  Caiaphas. — His  violent 
Adjuration. — Reply  of  Jesus. — "  Blasphemy." — "  Ish  maveth"  .  400 

CHARTER  LIX. 
THE  INTERVAL  BETWEEN  THE  TRIALS. 

The  First  Derision. — The  Outer  Court. — John  procures  Admission  for 
peter.— The  First  Denial.— The  Second  Denial.— The  Galilean 
Accent. — The  Third  Denial. — The  Look  of  Jesus. — The  Repentance  of 
Peter. — Brutal  Insults  of  the  Menials. — The  Dawn. — The  Meeting 
of  the  Sanhedrin. — Their  Divisions. — Third  Phase  of  the  Trial. — A 
Contrast  of  Two  Scenes  before  the  Sanhedrin. — Jesus  breaks  Hia 
Silence. — The  Condemnation. — The  Second  Derision. — The  Fate  of 
Jesus 410 

CHAPTER  LX. 
JESTIS  BEFORE  PILATE. 

"  Suffered  under  Pontius  Pilate." — What  is  known  of  Pilate. — First  Out- 
break of  the  Jews  against  him  on  his  arrival. — The  Aqueduct  and 
tho  Corban. — The  gilt  Votive  Shields. — The  Massacre  of  Galileans. — 
The  Massacre  of  Samaritans. — The  Palace  of  Herod. — Jesus  in  the 
Palace. — Led  before  Pilate. — Pilate  comes  out  to  the  Jews. — 1.  Hia 
Roman  Contemptuousnesa. — Determines  to  try  the  Case. — Vagueness 
of  the  Accusations.— "  Art  Thou  the  King  of  the  Jews?"— "What  is 


CONTENTS.  MIX 

MM 

truth?" — First  Acquittal. — 2.  Fierceness  of  the  Jews. — Jesus  sent  to 

Herod  Antipas. — Cruel  Frivolity  of  Herod. — Second  Acquittal. — 3. 
Last  Phase  of  the  Trial. — Temporising  of  Pilate. — Dream  of  his  Wife. 
— Cowardly  Concession. — Jesus  or  Bar- Abbas  ? — "  Crucify  Him."— 
The  Scourging.— Third  Derision.— The  Crown  of  Thorns.—"  Behold 
the  Man !  " — Last  efforts  of  Pilate  to  save  Him. — Last  Warning  to 
Pilate.—"  The  Son  of  God."—"  Behold  your  King."— Pilate  terrified 
at  tho  Name  of  Caesar. — He  gives  way. — He  washes  his  Hands. — 
"  His  blood  be  on  us,  and  on  our  children ! "  —  Fulfilment  of  the 
Imprecation 418 

CHAPTER  LXL 
THE  CRUCIFIXION. 

"  /,  mites,  fxpedi  cnteem." — Two  Malefactors. — The  Cross. — Procession  to 
Golgotha. — Simon  of  Cyrene. — The  Daughters  of  Jerusalem. — The 
Green  and  the  Dry  Tree. — Site  of  Golgotha. — The  Medicated  Draught. 
— The  Method  of  Crucifixion. — "Father,  forgive  them." — Agony  of 
Crucifixion. — The  Title  on  the  Cross. — Rage  of  the  Jews. — The 
Soldiers. — Parting  the  Garments. — Insults  of  the  Bystanders. — The 
Robber.— Silence  of  the  Sufferer.— The  Penitent  Robber.— "  To-day 
shalt  thou  be  with  me  in  paradise." — The  Women  from  Galilee.— 
"  Woman,  behold  thy  son." — The  Noonday  Darkness. — "  Eli,  Eli,  lama 
sabachthani ? " — "I  thirst." — Vinegar  to  Drink. — "  Into  Thy  hands." 
—"It  is  finished."— The  Centurion.— The  Multitude.— What  the 
Cross  of  Christ  has  Done. — Tho  Crurifragiuin. — Water  and  Blood  .  435 

CHAPTER   LXII. 
THE  RESURRECTION. 

Utter  apparent  Weakness  of  Christianity  at  the  Death  of  Christ.  —  Source 
of  its  subsequent  Strength. — Joseph  of  Arimathaea. — Nicodemus. — 
The  Garden  and  the  Sepulchre. — Tho  Women  mark  the  Spot. — Request 
of  tho  Sanhedrin  that  the  Tomb  might  be  guarded. — Tho  Dawn  of 
Easter  Day. — The  Women  at  the  Sepulchre.. — Tho  Empty  Tomb.— 
Peter  and  John. — 1.  First  Appearance  to  Mary  of  Magdala. — 2.  Ap- 
pearance to  the  Women. — Story  Invented  by  the  Jews. — 3.  Appearance 
to  Peter. — 4.  The  Disciples  at  Emmaus. — 5.  The  assembled  Apostles. 
— 6.  The  Apostles  and  Thomas. — 7.  At  the  Sea  of  Galilee. — Jesus  and 
Peter. — "Feed  my  lambs." — "What  shall  this  man  do?"— 8.  The 
five  Hundred  on  the  Mountain. — 9.  Appearance  to  James. — 10.  The 
Ascension.—"  At  the  right  hand  of  God,  the  Father  Almighty"  .  452 


THE  LIFE   OF    CHRIST. 


CHAPTER    T. 

TUB   NATIVITY. 

ONE  mile  from  Bethlehem  is  a  little  plain,  in  which,  under  a  grove  of 
olives,  stands  the  bare  and  neglected  chapel  known  by  the  name  of 
"  the  Angel  to  the  Shepherds."  It  is  built  over  the  traditional  site  of 
the  fields  where,  in  the  beautiful  language  of  St.  Luke — more  exquisito 
than  any  idyll  to  Christian  ears — "there  were  shepherds  keeping  watch 
over  their  flock  by  night,  when,  lo,  the  angel  of  the  Lord  came  upon 
them,  and  the  glory  of  the  Lord  shone  round  about  them,"  and  to  their 
happy  ears  were  uttered  the  good  tidings  of  great  joy,  that  unto  them 
was  born  that  day  in  the  city  of  David  a  Saviour,  which  was  Christ 
the  Lord. 

The  associations  of  our  Lord's  nativity  were  all  of  the  humblest 
character,  and  the  very  scenery  of  His  birthplace  was  connected  with 
memories  of  poverty  and  toil.  On  that  night,  indeed,  it  seemed  as 
though  the  heavens  must  burst  to  disclose  their  radiant  minstrelsies ; 
and  the  stars,  and  the  feeding  sheep,  and  tho  "  light  and  sound  in  the 
darkness  and  stillness,"  and  the  rapture  of  faithful  hearts,  combine  to 
furnish  us  with  a  picture  painted  in  the  colours  of  heaven.  But  in  the 
brief  and  thrilling  verses  of  the  Evangelist  we  aro  not  told  that  thoso 
angel  songs  were  heard  by  any  except  tho  wakeful  shepherds  of  an 
obscure  village ; — and  those  shepherds,  amid  the  chill  dews  of  a  winter 
night,  were  guarding  their  flocks  from  the  wolf  and  the  robber,  in  fields 
where  Ruth,  their  Saviour's  ancestress,  had  gleaned,  sick  at  hearfe,  amid 
the  alien  corn,  and  David,  the  despised  and  youngest  son  of  a  numerous 
family,  had  followed  the  ewes  great  with  young. 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

"And  suddenly,"  adds  the  sole  Evangelist  who  has  narrated  the 
circumstances  of  that  memorable  night  in  which  Jesus  was  born,  amid 
the  indifference  of  a  world  unconscious  of  its  Deliverer,  "  there  was 
with  the  angel  a  multitude  of  the  heavenly  host,  praising  God,  and 
saying,  Glory  to  God  in  the  highest,  and  on  earth  peace  among  men  of 
good  will."  >v*-^~  ^U-ULf  r*t/ix  ^/v*t*^ . 

It  might  have  been  expected  that  Christian  piety  would  have 
marked  the  spot  by  splendid  memorials,  and  enshrined  the  rude  grotto 
of  the  shepherds  in  the  marbles  and  mosaics  of  some  stately  church. 
But,  instead  of  this,  the  Chapel  of  the  Herald  Angel  is  a  mere  rude 
crypt  ;(and  as  the  traveller  descends  down  the  broken  steps  which  lead 
from  the  olive-grove  into  its  dim  recess,  he  can  hardly  persuade  himself 
that  he  is  in  a  consecrated  place.  Yet  a  half-unconscious  sense  of 
fitness  has,  perhaps,  contribute^,  to  this  apparent  neglect.  The  poverty 
of  the  chapel  harmonises  well  with  the  humble  toil  of  those  whose 
radiant  vision  it  is  intended  to  commemorate. 

"  Come  now  !  let  us  go  unto  Bethlehem,  and  see  this  thing  whicii 
has  come  to  pass,  which  the  Lord  made  known  to  us,"  said  the  shep- 
herds, when  those  angel  songs  had  ceased  to  break  the  starry  silence. 
(  Their  way  would  lead  them  up  the  terraced  hill,  and  through  the 
moonlit  gardens  of  Bethlehem,  until  they  reached  the  summit  of  the 
grey  ridge  on  which  the  little  town  is  built.  On  that  summit  stood 
the  village  inn.  The  khan  (or  caravanserai)  of  a  Syrian  village,  at 
that  day,  was  probably  identical,  in  its  appearance  and  accommodation, 
with  those  which  still  exist  in  modern  Palestine.  A  khan  is  a  low 
structure,  built  of  rough  stones,  and  generally  only  a  single  storey  in 
height.  It  consists  for  the  most  part  of  a  square  enclosure,  in  which 
the  cattle  can  be  tied  up  in  safety  for  the  night,  and  an  arched  recess 
for  the  accommodation  of  travellers.  The  leewan,  or  paved  floor  of  the 
recess,  is  raised  a  foot  or  two  above  the  level  of  the  court-yard.  A 
large  khan — such,  for  instance,  as  that  of  which  the  ruins  may  still  be 
seen  at  Khan  Minyeh,  on  the  shore  of  the  Sea  of  Galilee — might 
contain  a  series  of  such  recesses,  which  are,  in  fact,  low  small  rooms 
with  no  front  wall  to  them.  They  are,  of  course,  perfectly  public ; 
everything  that  takes  place  in  them  is  visible  to  every  person  in  the 
khan.  They  are  also  totally  devoid  of  even  the  most  ordinary  fur- 
niture. The  traveller  may  bring  his  own  carpet  if  he  likes,  may  sit 
cross-legged  upon  it  for  his  meals,  and  may  lie  upon  it  at  night.  As  a 
rule,  too,  he  must  bring  hia  own  food,  attend  to  his  own  cattle,  and 
draw  his  own  water  from  the  neighbouring  spring.  He  would  neither 
expect  nor  require  attendance,  and  would  pay  only  the  merest  trifle  for 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  3 

the  advantage  of  shelter,  safety,  and  a  floor  on  which  to  lie.  But  if  he 
chanced  to  arrive  late,  and  the  leewans  were  all  occupied  by  earlier 
guests,  he  would  have  no  choice  but  to  be  content  with  such  accommo- 
dation as  he  could  find  in  the  court-yard  below,  and  secure  for  himself 
and  his  family  such  small  amount  of  cleanliness  and  decency  as  are 
compatible  with  an  unoccupied  corner  on  the  filthy  area,  which  must 
be  shared  with  horses,  mules,  and  camels.  The  litter,  the  closeness, 
the  unpleasant  smell  of  the  crowded  animals,  the  unwelcome  intrusion 
of  the  pariah  dogs,  the  necessary  society  of  the  very  lowest  hangers-on 
of  the  caravanserai,  are  adjuncts  to  such  a  position  which  can  only  be 
realised  by  any  traveller  in  the  East  who  happens  to  have  been  placed 
in  similar  circumstances. 

In  Palestine  it  not  unfrequently  happens  that  the  entire  khan,  or 
at  any  rate  the  portion  of  it  in  which  the  animals  are  housed,  is  one 
of  those  innumerable  caves  which  abound  in  the  limestone  rocks  of  its 
central  hills.  Such  seems  to  have  been  the  case  at  the  little  town  of 
Bethlehem-Ephratah,  in  the  land  of  Judah.  Justin  Martyr,  the 
Apologist,  who,  from  his  birth  at  Shechem,  was  familiar  with 
Palestine,  and  who  lived  less  than  a  century  after  the  time  of  our 
Lord,  places  the  scene  of  the  nativity  in  a  cave.  This  is,  indeed,  the 
ancient  and  constant  tradition  both  of  the  Eastern  and  the  Western 
Churches,  and  it  is  one  of  the  few  to  which,  though  unrecorded  in  the 
Gospel  history,  we  may  attach  a  reasonable  probability.  Over  this 
cave  has  risen  the  Church  and  Convent  of  the  Nativity,  and  it  was  in 
a  cave  close  beside  it  that  one  of  the  most  learned,  eloquent,  and  holy 
of  the  Fathers  of  the  Church — that  great  St.,  Jerome  to  whom  we  owe 
the  received  Latin  translation  of  the  Bible — spent  thirty  of  his  declining 
years  in  study,  and  fast,  and  prayer. 

From  their  northern  home  at  Nazareth,  in  the  mountains  of 
Zabulon,  Joseph,  the  village  carpenter,  had  made  his  way  along  the 
wintry  roads  with  Mary  his  espoused  wife,  being  great  with  child. 
Fallen  as  were  their  fortunes,  they  were  both  of  the  house  and  lineage 
of  David,  and  they  were  traversing  a  journey  of  eighty  miles  to  the 
village  which  had  been  the  home  of  their  great  ancestor  while  he  was 
still  a  ruddy  shepherd  lad,  tending  his  flocks  upon  the  lonely  hills. 
The  object  of  that  toilsome  journey,  which  could  not  but  be  dis- 
agreeable to  the  settled  habits  of  Oriental  life,  was  to  enrol  their 
names  as  members  of  the  house  of  David  in  a  census  which  had  been 
ordered  by  the  Emperor  Augustus.  In  the  political  condition  of  the 
Roman  Empire,  of  which  Judaea  then  formed  a  part,  a  single  whisper 
of  the  Emperor  was  sufficiently  powerful  to  secure  the  execution  of 

B  2 


4  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

his  mandates  in  the  remotest  corners  of  the  civilised  world.  Great  as 
are  the  historic  difficulties  in  which  the  census  is  involved,  there  seems 
to  be  good  independent  grounds  for  believing  that  it  may  have  been 
originally  ordered  by  Sentius  Saturninus,  that  it  was  begun  by  Publius 
Sulpicius  Quirinus,  when  he  was  for  the  first  time  legate  of  Syria,  and 
that  it  was  completed  during  his  second  term  of  office.  In  deference 
to  Jewish  prejudices,  any  infringement  of  which  was  the  certain  signal 
for  violent  tumults  and  insurrection,  it  was  not  carried  out  in  the 
ordinary  Roman  manner,  at  each  person's  place  of  residence,  but 
according  to  Jewish  custom,  at  the  town  to  which  their  family 
originally  belonged.  The  Jews  still  clung  to  their  genealogies  and  to 
the  memory  of  long-extinct  tribal  relations ;  and  though  the  journey 
was  a  weary  and  distasteful  one,  the  mind  of  Joseph  may  well  have 
been  consoled  by  the  remembrance  of  that  heroic  descent  which  would 
now  be  authoritatively  recognised,  and  by  the  glow  of  those  Messianic 
hopes  to  which  the  marvellous  circumstances  of  which  he  was  almost 
the  sole  depositary  would  give  a  tenfold  intensity. 

Travelling  in  the  East  is  a  very  slow  and  leisurely  affair,  and  was 
likely  to  be  still  more  so  if,  as  is  probable,  the  country  was  at  that  time 
agitated  by  political  animosities.  Beeroth,  which  is  fifteen  miles 
distant  from.  Bethlehem,  or  possibly  even  Jerusalem,  which  is  only  six 
miles  off,  may  have  been  the  resting-place  of  Mary  and  Joseph  before 
this  last  stage  of  their  journey.  But  the  heavy  languor,  or  even  the 
commencing  pangs  of  travail,  must  necessarily  have  retarded  the 
progress  of  the  maiden-mother.  Others  who  were  travelling  on  the 
same  errand,  would  easily  have  passed  them  on  the  road,  and  when, 
after  toiling  up  the  steep  hill-side,  by  David's  well,  they  arrived  at  the 
khan — probably  the  very  one  which  had  been  known  for  centuries  as 
the  House  of  Chimham,  and  if  so,  covering  perhaps  the  very  ground 
on  which,  one  thousand  years  before,  had  stood  the  hereditary  house  of 
Boaz,  of  Jesse,  and  of  David — every  Icewan  was  occupied.  The  enrol- 
ment had  drawn  so  many  strangers  to  the  little  town,  that  "  there  was 
no  room  for  them  in  the  inn."  In  the  rude  limestone  grotto  attached 
to  it  as  a  stable,  among  the  hay  and  straw  spread  for  the  food  and 
rest  of  the  cattle,  weary  with  their  day's  journey,  far  from  home,  in 
the  midst  of  strangers,  in  the  chilly  winter  night — in  circumstances  so 
devoid  of  all  earthly  comfort  or  splendour  that  it  is  impossible  to 
imagine  a  humbler  nativity — Christ  was  born. 

Distant  but  a  few  miles,  on  the  plateau  of  the  abrupt  and  singular 
hill  now  called  Jebel  Fureidis,  or  "  Little  Paradise  Mountain,"  towered 
the  palace  fortress  of  the  Great  Herod.  The  magnificent  houses  of  his 


THE    LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  5 

friends  and  oourfciers  crowded  around  its  base.  The  humble  wayfarers, 
as  they  passed  near  it,  might  have  heard  the  hired  and  voluptuous 
minstrelsy  with  which  its  feasts  were  celebrated,  or  the  shouting  of  the 
rough  mercenaries  whose  arms  enforced  obedience  to  its  despotic  lord. 
But  the  true  King  of  the  Jews — the  rightful  Lord  of  the  Universe — • 
was  not  to  be  found  in  palace  or  fortress.  They  who  wear  soft 
clothing  are  in  king's  houses.  The  cattle-stables  of  the  lowly 
caravanserai  were  a  more  fitting  birthplace  for  Him  who  came  to 
reveal  that  the  soul  of  the  greatest  monarch  was  no  dearer  or  greater 
in  God's  sight  than  the  soul  of  his  meanest  slave ;  for  Him  who  had 
not  where  to  lay  His  head ;  for  him  who,  from  His  cross  of  shame, 
was  to  rule  the  world. 

Guided  by  the  lamp  which  usually  swings  from  the  centre  of  a  rope 
hung  across  the  entrance  of  the  khan,  ths  shepherds  made  their  way 
to  the  inn  of  Bethlehem,  and  found  Mary,  and  Joseph,  and  the  Babo 
lying  in  the  manger.  The  fancy  of  poet  and  painter  has  revelled  in 
the  imaginary  glories  of  the  scene.  They  have  sung  of  the  "  bright 
harnessed  angels"  who  hovered  there,  and  of  the  stars  lingering 
beyond  their  time  to  shed  their  sweet  influences  upon  that  smiling 
infancy.  They  have  painted  the  radiation  of  light  from  his  manger- 
cradle,  illuminating  all  the  place  till  the  bystanders  are  forced  to  shade 
their  eyes  from  that  heavenly  splendour.  But  all  this  is  wide  of  the 
reality.  Such  glories  as  the  simple  shepherds  saw  were  seen  only  by 
the  eye  of  faith  ;  and  all  which  met  their  gaze  was  a  peasant  of  Galilee, 
already  beyond  the  prime  of  life,  and  a  young  mother,  of  whom  they 
could  not  know  that  she  was  wedded  maid  and  virgin  wife,  with  an 
Infant  Child,  whom,  since  there  were  none  to  help  her,  her  own  hands 
had  wrapped  in  swaddling-clothes.  The  light  that  shined  in  the 
darkness  was  no  physical,  but  a  spiritual  beam ;  the  Dayspring  from 
on  high,  which  had  now  visited  mankind,  dawned  only  in  a  few  faith- 
ful and  humble  hearts. 

And  the  Gospels,  always  truthful  and  bearing  on  every  page  that 
simplicity  which  is  the  stamp  of  honest  narrative,  indicate  this  fact 
without  comment.  There  is  in  them  nothing  of  the  exuberance  of 
marvel,  and  mystery,  and  miracle,  which  appears  alike  in  the  Jewish 
imaginations  about  their  coming  Messiah,  and  in  the  apocryphal 
narratives  about  the  Infant  Christ.  There  is  no  more  decisive  criterion 
of  their  absolute  credibility  as  simple  histories,  than  the  marked  and 
violent  contrast  which  they  offer  to  all  the  spurions  gospels  of  the 
early  centuries,  and  all  the  imaginative  legends  which  have  clustered 
about  them.  Had  our  Gospels  been  unauthentic,  they  too  must 


G  THE   LIFE    OF   CHBIST. 

inevitably  have  partaken  of  the  characteristics  which  mark,  without 
exception,  every  early  fiction  about  the  Saviour's  life.  To  the  tin- 
illuminated  fancy  it  would  have  seemed  incredible  that  the  most 
stupendous  event  in  the  world's  history  should  have  taken  place 
without  convulsions  and  catastrophes.  In  the  Gospel  of  St.  James 
there  is  a  really  striking  chapter,  describing  how,  at  the  awful  moment 
of  the  nativity,  the  pole  of  the  heaven  stood  motionless,  and  the  birds 
were  still,  and  there  were  workmen  lying  on  the  earth  with  their  hands 
in  a  vessel,  "  and  those  who  handled  did  not  handle  it,  and  those  who 
took  did  not  lift,  and  those  who  presented  it  to  their  mouth  did  not 
present  it,  but  the  faces  of  all  were  looking  up  ;  and  I  saw  the  sheep 
scattered  and  the  sheep  stood,  and  the  shepherd  lifted  up  his  hand  to 
strike,  and  his  hand  remained  up  ;  and  I  looked  at  the  stream  of  the 
river,  and  the  mouths  of  the  kids  were  down,  and  were  not  drinking ; 
and  everything  which  was  being  propelled  forward  was  intercepted  in 
its  course."  But  of  this  sudden  hush  and  pause  of  awe-struck  Nature, 
of  the  parhelions  and  mysterious  splendours  which  blazed  in  many 
places  of  the  world,  of  the  painless  childbirth,  of  the  perpetual  vir- 
ginity, of  the  ox  and  the  ass  kneeling  to  worship  Him  in  the  manger, 
of  the  voice  with  which  immediately  after  His  birth  He  told  His 
mother  that  He  was  the  Son  of  God,  and  of  many  another  wonder 
which  rooted  itself  in  the  earliest  traditions,  there  is  no  trace  whatever 
in  the  New  Testament.  The  inventions  of  man  differ  wholly  from  the 
dealings  of  God.  In  His  designs  there  is  no  haste,  no  rest,  no  weariness, 
no  discontinuity ;  all  things  are  done  by  him  in  the  majesty  of  silence, 
and  they  are  seen  under  a  light  that  shineth  quietly  in  the  darkness, 
•"showing  all  things  in  the  slow  history  of  their  ripening."  "The 
unfathomable  depths  of  the  Divine  counsels,"  it  has  been  said,  "  were 
moved ;  the  fountains  of  the  great  deep  were  broken  up  ;  the  healing 
of  the  nations  was  issuing  forth  ;  but  nothing  was  seen  on  the  surface 
of  human  society  but  this  slight  rippling  of  the  water  ;  the  course  of 
human  things  went  on  as  usual,  while  each  was  taken  up  with  little 
projects  of  his  own." 

How  long  the  Virgin  Mother  and  her  holy  Child  stayed  in  this 
cave,  or  cattle- enclosure,  we  cannot  tell,  but  probably  it  was  not  for 
long.  The  word  rendered  "  manger  "  in  Luke  ii.  7,  is  of  very  uncertain 
meaning,  nor  can  we  discover  more  about  it  than  that  it  means  a  place 
where  animals  were  fed.  It  is  probable  that  the  crowd  in  the  khan 
would  not  be  permanent,  and  common  humanity  would  have  dictated 
an  early  removal  of  the  mother  and  her  child  to  some  more  appropriate 
resting-place.  The  Magi,  as  we  see  from  St.  Matthew,  visited  Mary 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRfST.  7 

in  "  the  house."  But  on  all  these  minor  incidents  the  Gospels  do  not 
dwell.  The  fullest  of  them  is  St.  Luke,  and  the  singular  sweetness 
of  his  narrative,  its  almost  idyllic  grace,  its  sweet  calm  tone  of  noblo 
reticence,  seem  clearly  to  indicate  that  he  derived  it,  though  but  in 
fragmentary  notices,  from  the  lips  of  Mary  herself.  It  is,  indeed, 
difficult  to  imagine  from  whom  else  it  could  have  come,  for  mothers 
are  the  natural  historians  of  infant  years ;  but  it  is  interesting  to  find, 
in  the  actual  style,  that  "  colouring  of  a  woman's  memory  and  a 
woman's  view,"  which  we  should  naturally  have  expected  in  confirma- 
tion of  a  conjecture  so  obvious  and  so  interesting.  To  one  who  was 
giving  the  reins  to  his  imagination,  the  minutest  incidents  would  have 
claimed  a  description ;  to  Mary  they  would  have  seemed  trivial  and 
irrelevant.  Others  might  wonder,  but  in  her  all  wonder  was  lost  in 
the  one  overwhelming  revelation — the  one  absorbing  consciousness. 
Of  such  things  she  could  not  lightly  speak ;  "  she  kept  all  these  things, 
and  pondered  them  in  her  heart."  The  very  depth  aud  sacredness  of 
that  reticence  is  the  natural  and  probable  explanation  of  the  fact,  that 
some  of  the  details  of  the  Saviour's  infancy  are  fully  recorded  by  St. 
Luke  alone. 


CHAPTER  H. 

THE   PRESENTATION  IN  THE   TEMPLE. 

FOUR  events  only  of  our  Lord's  infancy  are  narrated  by  the  Gospels — 
namely,  the  Circumcision,  the  Presentation  in  the  Temple,  the  Visit  of 
the  Magi,  and  the  Flight  into  Egypt.  Of  these  the  first  two  occur 
only  in  St.  Luke,  the  last  two  only  in  St.  Matthew.  Yet  no  single 
particular  can  be  pointed  out  in  which  the  two  narratives  .are  neces- 
sarily contradictory.  If,  on  other  grounds,  we  have  ample  reason  to 
accept  the  evidence  of  the  Evangelists,  as  evidence  given  by  witnesses 
of  unimpeachable  honesty,  we  have  every  right  to  believe  that,  to 
whatever  cause  the  confessed  fragmentariness  of  their  narratives  may 
be  due,  those  narratives  may  fairly  be  regarded  as  supplementing  each 
other.  It  is  as  dishonest  to  assume  the  existence  of  irreconcilable 
discrepancies,  as  it  is  to  suggest  the  adoption  of  impossible  harmonies. 
The  accurate  and  detailed  sequence  of  biographical  narrative  from  the 


8  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

earliest  years  of  life  was  a  thing  wholly  unknown  to  the  Jews,  and 
alien  alike  from  their  style  and  temperament.  Anecdotes  of  infancy, 
incidents  of  childhood,  indications  of  future  greatness  in  boyish  years, 
are  a  very  rare  phenomenon  in  ancient  literature.  It  is  only  since  the 
dawn  of  Christianity  that  childhood  has  been  surrounded  by  a  halo  of 
romance. 

The  exact  order  of  the  events  which  occurred  before  the  return  to 
Nazareth  can  only  be  a  matter  of  uncertain  conjecture.  The  Circum- 
cision was  on  the  eighth  day  after  the  birth  (Luke  i.  59 ;  ii.  21)  ;  the 
Purification  was  thirty-three  days  after  the  circumcision  (Lev.  xii.  4)  ; 
the  Visit  of  the  Magi  was  when  "  Jesus  was  born  in  Bethlehem " 
(Matt.  ii.  1) ;  and  the  Flight  into  Egypt  immediately  after  their 
departure.  The  supposition  that  the  return  from  Egypt  was  previous 
to  the  Presentation  in  the  Temple,  though  not  absolutely  impossible, 
seems  most  improbable.  To  say  nothing  of  the  fact  that  such  a  post- 
ponement would  have  been  a  violation  (however  necessary)  of  the 
Levitical  law,  it  would  either  involve  the  supposition  that  the  Purifica- 
tion was  long  postponed,  which  seems  to  be  contradicted  by  the  twice- 
repeated  expression  of  St.  Luke  (ii.  22,  39)  ;  or  it  supposes  that  forty 
days  allowed  sufficient  time  for  the  journey  of  the  Wise  Men  from  "  the 
East,"  and  for  the  flight  to,  and  return  from,  Egypt.  It  involves, 
moreover,  the  extreme  improbability  of  a  return  of  the  Holy  Family  to 
Jerusalem — a  town  but  six  miles  distant  from  Bethlehem — within  a 
few  days  after  an  event  so  frightful  as  the  Massacre  of  the  Innocents 
Although  no  supposition  is  entirely  free  from  the  objections  which 
necessarily  arise  out  of  our  ignorance  of  the  circumstances,  it  seems 
almost  certain  that  the  Flight  into  Egypt,  and  the  circumstances  which 
led  to  it,  did  not  occur  till  after  the  presentation.  For  forty  days, 
therefore,  the  Holy  Family  were  left  in  peace  and  obscurity,  in  a  spot 
surrounded  by  so  many  scenes  of  interest,  and  hallowed  by  so  many 
traditions  of  their  family  and  race.  , 

Of  the  Circumcision  no  mention  is  made  by  the  apocryphal  gospels, 
except  an  amazingly  repulsive  one  in  the  Arabic  Gospel  of  the  Infancy. 
It  was  not  an  incident  which  would  be  likely  to  interest  those  whoso 
object  it  was  to  intrude  their  own  dogmatic  fancies  into  the  sacred 
story.  But  to  the  Christian  it  has  its  own  solemn  meaning.  It  shows 
that  Christ  came  not  to  destroy  the  Law,  but  to  fulfil.  Thus  it  became 
Him  to  fulfil  all  righteousness.  Thus  early  did  He  suffer  pain  for  our 
S  to  teach  ns  the  spiritual  circumcision — the  circumcision  of  the 
heart — the  circumcision  of  all  our  bodily  senses.  As  the  East  catches 
at  sunset  the  colours  of  the  West,  so  Bethlehem  is  a  prelude  to  Calvary, 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  9 

and  even  the  Infant's  cradle  is  tinged  with  a  crimson  reflection  from 
the  Redeemer's  cross.  It  was  on  this  day,  too,  that  Christ  first  publicly 
received  that  name  of  Jesus,  which  the  command  of  the  angel  Gabriel 
had  already  announced.  "  Hoshea  "  meant  salvation ;  Joshua,  "  whose 
salvation  is  Jehovah ; "  Jesus  is  but  the  English  modification  of  the 
Greek  form  of  the  name.  At  this  time  it  was  a  name  extraordinarily 
common  among  the  Jews.  It  was  dear  to  them  as  having  been  borne 
by  the  great  Leader  who  had  conducted  them  into  victorious  possession 
of  the  Promised  Land,  and  by  the  great  High  Priest  who  had  headed 
the  band  of  exiles  who  returned  from  Babylon ;  but  henceforth — not 
for  Jews  only,  but  for  all  the  world — it  was  destined  to  acquire  a  signi- 
ficance infinitely  more  sacred  as  the  mortal  designation  of  the  Son  of 
God.  The  Hebrew  "Messiah"  and  the  Greek  "Christ"  were  names 
which  represented  His  office  as  the  Anointed  Prophet,  Priest,  and 
King ;  but  "  Jesus "  was  the  personal  name  which  He  bore  as  one 
who  "  emptied  Himself  of  His  glory  "  to  become  a  sinless  man  among 
sinful  men. 

On  the  fortieth  day  after  the  nativity — until  which  time  she  could 
not  leave  the  house — the  Virgin  presented  herself  with  her  Babe  for 
their  Purification  in  the  Temple  at  Jerusalem.  "Thus,  then,"  says 
St.  Bonaventura,  "do  they  bring  the  Lord  of  the  Temple  to  the 
Temple  of  the  Lord."  The  proper  offering  on  such  occasions  was  a 
yearling  lamb  for  a  burnt-offering,  and  a  young  pigeon  or  a  turtle-dove 
for  a  sin-offering ;  but  with  that  beautiful  tenderness,  which  is  so 
marked  a  characteristic  of  the  Mosaic  legislation,  those  who  were  too 
poor  for  so  comparatively  costly  an  offering,  were  allowed  to  bring 
instead  two  turtle-doves  or  two  young  pigeons.  With  this  humble 
offering  Mary  presented  herself  to  the  priest.  At  the  same  time  Jesus, 
as  being  a  first-born  son,  was  presented  to  God,  and  in  accordance  with 
the  law,  was  redeemed  from  the  necessity  of  Temple  service  by  the 
ordinary  payment  of  five  shekels  of  the  sanctuary  (Numb,  xviii.  15, 16), 
amounting  in  value  to  about  fifteen  shillings.  Of  the  purification  and 
presentation  no  further  details  are  given  to  us,  but  this  visit  to  the 
Temple  was  rendered  memorable  by  a  double  incident — the  recognition 
of  the  Infant  Saviour  by  Simeon  and  Anna. 

Of  Simeon  we  are  simply  told  that  he  was  a  just  and  devout 
Israelite  endowed  with  the  gift  of  prophecy,  and  that  having  received 
divine  intimation  that  his  death  would  not  take  place  till  he  had  seen 
the  Messiah,  he  entered  under  some  inspired  impulse  into  the  Temple, 
and  there,  recognising  the  Holy  Child,  took  Him  in  his  arms,  and  burst 
into  that  glorious  song — the  "  Nunc  Dimittis  " — which  for  eighteen 


10  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

centuries  has  been  so  dear  to  Christian  hearts.  The  prophecy  that  the 
Babe  should  be  "  a  light  to  lighten  the  Gentiles,"  no  less  than  the 
strangeness  of  the  circumstances,  may  well  have  caused  astonishment 
to  His  parents,  from  whom  the  aged  prophet  did  not  conceal  their  own 
future  sorrows — warning  the  Virgin  Mother  especially,  both  of  the 
deadly  opposition  which  that  Divine  Child  was  destined  to  encounter, 
and  of  the  national  perils  which  should  agitate  the  days  to  come. 

Legend  has  been  busy  with  the  name  of  Simeon.  In  the  Arabic 
Gospel  of  the  Infancy,  he  recognises  Jesus  because  he  sees  Him  shining 
like  a  pillar  of  light  in  His  mother's  arms.  Nicephorus  tells  us  that, 
in  reading  the  Scriptures,  he  had  stumbled  at  the  verse,  "  Behold,  a 
virgin  shall  conceive,  and  bear  a  son"  (Isa.  vii.  14),  and  had  then 
received  the  intimation  that  he  should  not  die  till  he  had  seen  it 
fulfilled.  All  attempts  to  identify  him  with  other  Simeons  have 
failed.  Had  he  been  a  High  Priest,  or  President  of  the  Sanhedrin, 
St.  Luke  would  not  have  introduced  him  so  casually  as  "a  man 
(avdpwiros)  in  Jerusalem  whose  name  was  Simeon."  The  statement 
in  the  Gospel  of  the  Nativity  of  Mary  that  he  was  113  years  old  is 
wholly  arbitrary ;  as  is  the  conjecture  that  the  silence  of  the  Talmud 
about  him  is  due  to  his  Christian  proclivities.  He  could  not  have  been 
Rabban  Simeon,  the  son  of  Hillel,  and  father  of  Gamaliel,  who  would 
not  at  this  time  have  been  so  old.  Still  less  could  he  have  been  the 
far  earlier  Simeon  the  Just,  who  was  believed  to  have  prophesied  the 
destruction  of  Jerusalem,  and  who  was  the  last  survivor  of  the  great 
Sanhedrin.  It  is  curious  that  we  should  be  told  nothing  respecting 
him,  while  of  Anna  the  prophetess  several  interesting  particulars  are 
given,  and  among  others  that  she  was  of  the  tribe  of  Asher — a 
valuable  proof  that  tribal  relations  still  lived  affectionately  in  the 
memory  of  the  people. 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE    VISIT    OF    THE    MAGI. 


THE  brief  narrative  of  the  Visit  of  the  Magi,  recorded  in  the  second 
chapter  of  St.  Matthew,  is  of  the  deepest  interest  in  the  history 
of  Christianity.  It  is,  in  the  first  place,  the  Epiphany,  or 
Manifestation  of  Christ  to  the  Gentiles.  It  brings  the  facts  of  the 


THE   LIFB   OF   CHBIST.  11 

Gospel  history  into  close  connection  with  Jewish  belief,  with  ancient 
prophecy,  with  secular  history,  and  with  modern  science ;  and  in  doing 
so  it  furnishes  us  with  new  confirmations  of  our  faith,  derived 
incidentally,  and.  therefore  in  the  most  unsuspicious  manner,  from 
indisputable  and  unexpected  quarters. 

Herod  the  Great,  who,  after  a  life  of  splendid  misery  and  criminal 
success,  had  now  sunk  into  the  jealous  decrepitude  of  his  savage  old 
age,  was  residing  in  his  new  palace  on  Zion,  when,  half  maddened  as 
he  was  already  by  the  crimes  of  his  past  career,  he  was  thrown  into 
a  fresh  paroxysm  of  alarm  and  anxiety  by  the  visit  of  some  Eastern 
Magi,  bearing  the  strange  intelligence  that  they  had  seen  in  the  East 
the  star  of  a  new-born  king  of  the  Jews,  and  had  come  to  worship 
him.  Herod,  a  mere  Idumsean  usurper,  a  more  than  suspected 
apostate,  the  detested  tyrant  over  an  unwilling  people,  the  sacri- 
legious plunderer  of  the  tomb  of  David — Herod,  a  descendant  of 
the  despised  Ishmael  and  the  hated  Esau,  heard  the  tidings  with 
a  terror  and  indignation  which  it  was  hard  to  dissimulate.  The 
grandson  of  one  who,  as  was  believed,  had  been  a  mere  servitor  in 
a  temple  at  Ascalon,  and  who  in  his  youth  had  been  carried  off  by 
Edomite  brigands,  he  well  knew  how  worthless  were  his  pretensions 
to  an  historic  throne  which  he  held  solely  by  successful  adventure. 
But  his  craft  equalled  his  cruelty,  and  finding  that  all  Jerusalem 
shared  his  suspense,  he  summoned  to  his  palace  the  leading  priests 
and  theologians  of  the  Jews — perhaps  the  relics  of  that  Sanhedrin 
which  he  had  long  reduced  to  a  despicable  shadow — to  inquire  of  them 
where  the  Messiah  was  to  be  born.  He  received  the  ready  and 
confident  answer  that  Bethlehem  was  the  town  indicated  for  that 
honour  by  the  prophecy  of  Micah.  Concealing,  therefore,  his  desperate 
intention,  he  dispatched  the  Wise  Men  to  Bethlehem,  bidding  them 
to  let  him  know  as  soon  as  they  had  found  the  child,  that  he  too  might 
come  and  do  him  reverence. 

Before  continuing  the  narrative,  let  us  pause  to  inquire  who  these 
Eastern  wanderers  were,  and  what  can  be  discovered  respecting  their 
mysterious  mission. 

The  name  "  Magi,"  by  which  they  are  called  in  the  Greek  of 
St.  Matthew,  is  perfectly  vague.  It  meant  originally  a  sect  of 
Median  and  Persian  scholars;  it  was  subsequently  applied  (as  in 
Acts  xiii.  6)  to  pretended  astrologers,  or  Oriental  soothsayers.  Such 
characters  were  well  known  to  antiquity,  tinder  the  name  of  Chaldaeans, 
and  their  visits  were  by  no  means  unfamiliar  even  to  the  Western 
nations.  Diogenes  Laertius  reports  to  us  a  story  of  Aristotle,  that  a 


12  THE    LIFE    OF  CUBIST. 

Syrian  mage  had  predicted  to  Socrates  that  he  would  die  a  violent 
death ;  and  Seneca  informs  us  that  magi,  "  qui  forte  Athenis  erant," 
had  visited  the  tomb  of  Plato,  and  had  there  offered  incense  to  him  as 
a  divine  being.  There  is  nothing  but  a  mass  of  confused  and  contra- 
dictory traditions  to  throw  any  light  either  on  their  rank,  their  country, 
their  number,  or  their  names.  The  tradition  which  makes  them  kings 
was  probably  founded  on  the  prophecy  of  Isaiah  (Ix.  3)  :  "  And  the 
Gentiles  shall  come  to  thy  light,  and  kings  to  the  brightness  of  thy 
rising."  The  fancy  that  they  were  Arabians  may  have  arisen  from 
the  fact  that  myrrh  and  frankincense  are  Arabian  products,  joined  to 
the  passage  in  Ps.  bcxii.  10,  "  The  kings  of  Tharshish  and  of  the  isles 
shall  give  presents ;  the  kings  of  Arabia  and  Saba  shall  bring  gifts." 

There  was  a  double  tradition  as  to  their  number.  Augustine  and 
Chrysostom  say  that  there  were  twelve,  but  the  common  belief,  arising 
perhaps  from  the  triple  gifts,  is  that  they  were  three  in  number.  The 
Venerable  Bede  even  gives  us  their  names,  their  country,  and  their 
personal  appearance.  Melchior  was  an  old  man  with  white  hair  and 
long  beard  ;  Caspar,  a  ruddy  and  beardless  youth  ;  Balthasar,  swarthy 
find  in  the  prime  of  life.  We  are  further  informed  by  tradition  that 
Melchior  was  a  descendant  of  Shem,  Caspar  of  Ham,  and  Balthasar  of 
Japheth.  Thus  they  are  made  representatives  of  the  three  periods  of 
life,  and  the  three  divisions  of  the  globe;  and  valueless  as  such  fictions 
may  be  for  direct  historical  purposes,  they  have  been  rendered  interest- 
ing by  their  influence  on  the  most  splendid  productions  of  religious 
art.  The  skulls  of  these  three  kings,  each  circled  with  its  crown  of 
jewelled  gold,  are  still  exhibited  among  the  relics  in  the  cathedral  at 
Cologne. 

It  is,  however,  more  immediately  to  our  purpose  to  ascertain  the 
causes  of  their  memorable  journey. 

We  are  informed  by  Tacitus,  by  Suetonius,  and  by  Josephus, '  that 
there  prevailed  throughout  the  entire  East  at  this  time  an  intense 
conviction,  derived  from  ancient  prophecies,  that  ere  long  a  powerful 
monarch  would  arise  in  Judrea,  and  gain  dominion  over  the  world.  It 
has,  indeed,  been  conjectured  that  the  Roman  historians  may  simply 
be  echoing  an  assertion,  for  which  Josephus  was  in  reality  their  solo 
authority;  but  even  if  we  accept  this  uncertain  supposition,  there  is 
still  ample  proof,  both  in  Jewish  and  in  Pagan  writings,  that  a  guilty 
and  weary  world  was  dimly  expecting  the  advent  of  its  Deliverer. 
"  The  dew  of  blessing  falls  not  on  us,  and  our  fruits  have  no  taste," 
exclaimed  Rabban  Simeon,  the  son  of  Gamaliel ;  and  the  expression 
might  sum  up  much  of  the  literature  of  an  age  which  was,  as  Niebuhr 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  13 

says,  "  effete  with  tho  drunkenness  of  crime."  The  splendid  vaticina- 
tion in  the  fourth  Eclogue  of  Virgil  proves  the  intensity  of  the  feeling, 
and  has  long  been,  reckoned  among  the  "  unconscious  prophecies  of 
heathendom." 

There  is,  therefore,  nothing  extraordinary  in  the  fact  that  those 
Eastern  magi  should  have  bent  their  steps  to  Jerusalem,  especially  if 
there  were  any  circumstances  to  awaken  in  the  East  a  more  immediate 
conviction  that  this  wide-spread  expectation  was  on  the  point  of  fulfil- 
ment. If  they  were  disciples  of  Zoroaster,  they  would  see  in  the 
infant  King  the  future  conqueror  of  Ahriman,  the  destined  Lord  of  all 
the  "World.  The  story  of  their  journey  has  indeed  been  set  down  with 
contemptuous  confidence  as  a  mere  poetic  myth  ;  but  though  its  actual 
historic  verity  must  rest  on  the  testimony  of  the  Evangelist  alone, 
there  are  many  facts  which  enable  us  to  see  that  in  its  main  -outlines 
it  involves  nothing  either  impossible  or  even  improbable. 

Now  St.  Matthew  tells  us  that  the  cause  of  their  expectant  attitude 
was  that  they  had  seen  the  star  of  the  Messiah  in  the  East,  and  that 
to  discover  Him  was  the  motive  of  their  journey. 

That  any  strange  sidereal  phenomenon  should  be  interpreted  as  the 
signal  of  a  coming  king,  was  in  strict  accordance  with  the  belief  of 
their  age.  Such  a  notion  may  well  have  arisen  from  the  prophecy  of 
Balaam,  the  Gentile  sorcerer — a  prophecy  which,  from  the  power  of  its 
rhythm  and  the  splendour  of  its  imagery,  could  hardly  fail  to  be  dis- 
seminated in  eastern  countries.  Nearly  a  century  afterwards,  the  false 
Messiah,  in  the  reign  of  Hadrian,  received  from  the  celebrated  Rabbi 
Akiba,  the  surname  of  Bar-Cocheba,  or  "  Son  of  a  Star,"  and  caused 
a  star  to  be  stamped  upon  the  coinage  which  he  issued.  Six  centuries 
afterwards,  Mahomet  is  said  to  have  pointed  to  a  comet  as  a  portent 
illustrative  of  his  pretensions.  Even  the  Greeks  and  Romans  had 
always  considered  that  the  births  and  deaths  of  great  men  were 
symbolised  by  the  appearance  and  disappearance  of  heavenly  bodies, 
and  the  same  belief  has  continued  down  to  comparatively  modern 
times.  The  evanescent  star  which  appeared  in  the  time  of  Tycho 
Brahe,  and  was  noticed  by  him  on  Nov.  11,  1572,  was  believed  to 
indicate  the  brief  but  dazzling  career  of  some  warrior  from  the  north, 
and  was  subsequently  regarded  as  having  been  prophetic  of  the  for- 
tunes of  Gustavus  Adolphus.  Now  it  so  happens  that,  although  tho 
exact  year  in  which  Christ  was  born  is  not  ascertainable  with  any 
certainty  from  Scripture,  yet,  within  a  few  years  of  what  must,  on 
any  calculation,  have  been  the  period  of  His  birth,  there  undoubtedly 
did  appear  a  phenomenon  in  the  heavens  so  remarkable  that  it  could 


14  THE   LIFE   OP   CHEIST. 

not  possibly  have  escaped  the  observation  of  an  astrological  people. 
The  immediate  applicability  of  this  phenomenon  to  the  Gospel  nar- 
rative is  now  generally  abandoned ;  bnt,  whatever  other  theory  may 
be  held  about  it,  it  is  unquestionably  important  and  interesting  as 
having  furnished  one  of  the  data  which  first  led  to  the  discovery,  that 
the  birth  of  Christ  took  place  three  or  four  years  before  our  received 
era.  This  appearance,  and  the  circumstances  which  have  been  brought 
into  connection  with  it,  we  will  proceed  to  notice.  They  form  a 
curious  episode  in  the  history  of  exegesis,  and  are  otherwise  remark- 
able ;  but  we  must  fully  warn  the  reader  that  the  evidence  by  which 
this  astronomical  fact  has  been  brought  into  immediate  connection 
with  St.  Matthew's  narrative  is  purely  conjectural,  and  must  be 
received,  if  received  at  all,  with  considerable  caution. 

On  Dec.  17,  1603,  there  occurred  a  conjunction  of  the  two  largest 
superior  planets,  Saturn  and  Jupiter,  in  the  zodiacal  sign  of  the 
Fishes,  in  the  watery  trigon.  In  the  following  spring  they  were 
joined  in  the  fiery  trigon  by  Mars,  and  in  Sept.,  1604,  there  appeared 
in  the  foot  of  Ophiuchus,  and  between  Mars  and  Saturn,  a  new  star  of 
the  first  magnitude,  which,  after  shining  for  a  whole  year,  gradually 
waned  in  March,  1606,  and  finally  disappeared.  Bruno wski,  the  pupil 
of  Kepler,  who  first  noticed  it,  describes  it  as  sparkling  with  an  inter- 
change of  colours  like  a  diamond,  and  as  not  being  in  any  way 
nebulous,  or  offering  any  analogy  to  a  comet.  These  remarkable 
phenomena  attracted  the  attention  of  the  great  Kepler,  who,  from 
his  acquaintance  with  astrology,  knew  the  immense  importance  which 
such  a  conjunction  would  have  had  in  the  eyes  of  the  Magi,  and  wished 
to  discover  whether  any  such  conjunction  had  taken  place  about  the 
period  of  our  Lord's  birth.  Now  there  is  a  conjunction  of  Jupiter  and 
Saturn  in  the  same  trigon  about  every  twenty  years,  but  in  every 
200  years  they  pass  into  another  trigon,  and  are  not  conjoined  in  the 
same  trigon  again  (after  passing  through  the  entire  Zodiac),  till  after 
a  lapse  of  794  years,  four  months,  and  twelve  days.  By  calculating 
backwards,  Kepler  discovered  that  the  same  conjunction  of  Jupiter 
and  Saturn,  in  Pisces,  had  happened  no  less  than  three  times  in  the 
year  A.U.C.  747,  and  that  the  planet  Mars  had  joined  them  in  the 
spring  of  748  ;  and  the  general  fact  that  there  was  such  a  combination 
at  this  period  has  been  verified  by  a  number  of  independent  investi- 
gators, and  docs  not  seem  to  admit  of  denial.  And  however  we 
may  apply  the  fact,  it  is  certainly  an  interesting  one.  For  such  a 
conjunction  would  at  once  have  been  interpreted  by  the  Chaldsean 
observers  as  indicating  the  approach  of  some  memorable  event;  and 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHEIST.  15 

since  it  occurred  in  the  constellation  Pisces,  which  was  supposed  by 
astrologers  to  be  immediately  connected  with  the  fortunes  of  Judaea,  it 
would  naturally  turn  their  thoughts  in  that  direction.  The  form  of 
their  interpretation  would  be  moulded,  both  by  the  astrological 
opinions  of  the  Jews — which  distinctly  point  to  this  very  conjunction 
as  an  indication  of  the  Messiah — and  by  the  expectation  of  a  Deliverer 
which  was  so  widely  spread  at  the  period  in  which  they  lived. 

The  appearance  and  disappearance  of  new  stars  is  a  phenomenon 
by  no  means  so  rare  as  to  admit  of  any  possible  doubt.  The  fact  that 
St.  Matthew  speaks  of  such  a  star  within  two  or  three  years,  at  the 
utmost,  of  a  time  when  we  know  that  there  was  this  remarkable 
planetary  conjunction,  and  the  fact  that  there  was  such  a  star  nearly 
1,600  years  afterwards,  at  the  time  of  a  similar  conjunction,  can  only 
be  regarded  as  a  curious  coincidence.  We  should,  indeed,  have  a 
strong  and  strange  confirmation  of  one  main  fact  in  St.  Matthew's 
narrative,  if  any  reliance  could  be  placed  on  the  assertion  that,  in  the 
astronomical  tables  of  the  Chinese,  a  record  has  been  preserved  that 
a  new  star  did  appear  in  the  heavens  at  this  very  epoch.  But  it  would 
be  obviously  idle  to  build  on  a  datum  which  is  so  incapable  of  verifica- 
tion and  so  enveloped  with  uncertainty. 

We  are,  in  fact,  driven  to  the  conclusion  that  the  astronomical 
researches  which  have  proved  the  reality  of  this  remarkable  planetary 
conjunction  are  only  valuable  as  showing  the  possibility  that  it  may 
have  prepared  the  Magi  for  the  early  occurrence  of  some  great  event. 
And  this  confident  expectation  may  have  led  to  their  journey  to 
Palestine,  on  the  subsequent  appearance  of  an  evanescent  star,  an 
appearance  by  no  means  unparalleled  in  the  records  of  astronomy,  but 
which  in  this  instance  seems  to  rest  on  the  authority  of  the  Evangelist 
alone. 

No  one,  at  any  rate,  need  stumble  over  the  supposition  that  an 
apparent  sanction  is  thus  extended  to  the  combinations  of  astrology. 
Apart  from  astrology  altogether,  it  is  conceded  by  many  wise  and 
candid  observers,  even  by  the  great  Niebuhr,  the  last  man  in  the 
world  to  be  carried  away  by  credulity  or  superstition,  that  greaA 
catastrophes  and  unusual  phenomena  in  nature  have,  as  a  matter  of 
fact — however  we  may  choose  to  interpret  such  a  fact — synchronised  \ 
in  a  remarkable  manner  with  great  events  in  human  history.  IfcJ 
would  not,  therefore,  imply  any  prodigious  folly  on  the  part  of  the 
Magi  to  regard  the  planetary  conjunction  as  something  providentially 
significant.  And  if  astrology  be  ever  so  absurd,  yet  there  is  nothing 
absurd  in  the  supposition  that  the  Magi  should  be  led  to  truth,  even 


16  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST- 

through  the  gateways  of  delusion,  if  the  spirit  of  sincerity  and  truth 
was  in  them.  The  history  of  science  will  furnish  repeated  instances, 
not  only  of  the  enormous  discoveries  accorded  to  apparent  accident, 
but  even  of  the  immense  results  achieved  in  the  investigation  of 
innocent  and  honest  error.  Saul,  who  in  seeking  asses  found  a 
kingdom,  is  but  a  type  of  many  another  seeker  in  many  another  age. 

The  Magi  came  to  Bethlehem,  and  offered  to  the  young  child  in 
his  rude  and  humble  resting-place  a  reverence  which  we  do  not  hear 
that  they  had  paid  to  the  usurping  Edomite  in  his  glittering  palace. 
"And  when  they  had  opened  their  treasures  they  presented  unto  him 
gifts,  gold,  and  frankincense,  and  myrrh."  The  imagination  of  early 
Christians  has  seen  in  each  gift  a  special  significance :  myrrh  for  the 
human  nature,  gold  to  the  king,  frankincense  to  the  divinity ;  or,  the 
gold  for  the  race  of  Shem,  the  myrrh  for  the  race  of  Ham,  the  incense 
for  the  race  of  Japheth ; — innocent  fancies,  only  worthy  of  mention 
because  of  their  historic  interest,  and  their  bearing  on  the  conceptions 
of  Christian  poetry  and  Christian  art. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

THE    FLIGHT   INTO   EGYPT,    AND   THE   MASSACRE    OF  THE   INNOCENTS. 

WHEN  they  had  offered  their  gifts,  the  Wise  Men  would  naturally 
have  returned  to  Herod,  but  being  warned  of  God  in  a  dream,  they 
returned  to  their  own  land  another  way.  Neither  in  Scripture,  nor  in 
authentic  history,  nor  even  in  early  apocryphal  tradition,  do  we  find 
any  further  traces  of  their  existence;  but  their  visit  led  to  very 
memorable  events. 

The  dream  which  warned  them  of  danger  may  very  probably  have 
fallen  in  with  their  own  doubts  about  the  cruel  and  crafty  tyrant  who 
had  expressed  a  hypocritical  desire  to  pay  his  homage  to  the  Infant 
King ;  and  if,  as  we  may  suppose,  they  imparted  to  Joseph  any  hint 
as  to  their  misgivings,  he  too  would  be  prepared  for  the  warning 
dream  which  bade  him  fly  to  Egypt  to  save  the  young  child  from 
Herod'a  jealousy. 

Egypt  has,  in  all  ages,  been  the  natural  place  of  refuge  for  all  who 
were  driven  from  Palestine  by  distress,  persecution,  or  discontent. 


TUB   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  17 

Rhinokolura,  the  river  of  Egypt,  or  as  Milton,  with  his  usual  exquisite 
and  learned  accuracy  calls  it, — 

"  The  brook  that  parts 
Egypt  from  Syrian  ground," 

might  have  been  reached  by  the  fugitives  in  three  days;  and  once 
upon  the  farther  bank,  they  were  beyond  the  reach  of  Herod's  juris- 
diction. 

Of  the  flight,  and  its  duration,  Scripture  gives  us  no  further  par- 
ticulars ;  telling  us  only  that  the  Holy  Family  fled  by  night  from 
Bethlehem,  and  returned  when  Joseph  had  again  been  assured  by  a 
dream  that  it  would  be  safe  to  take  back  the  Saviour  to  the  land  of 
His  nativity.  It  is  left  to  apocryphal  legends,  immortalised  by  the 
genius  of  Italian  art,  to  tell  us  how,  on  the  way,  the  dragons  came  and 
bowed  to  Him,  the  lions  and  leopards  adored  Him,  the  roses  of  Jericho 
blossomed  wherever  His  footsteps  trod,  the  palm-trees  at  His  command 
bent  down  to  give  them  dates,  the  robbers  were  overawed  by  His 
majesty,  and  the  journey  was  miraculously  shortened.  They  tell  us 
further  how,  at  His  entrance  into  the  country,  all  the  idols  of  the  land 
of  Egypt  fell  from  their  pedestals  with  a  sudden  crash,  and  lay 
shattered  and  broken  upon  their  faces,  and  how  many  wonderful  cures 
of  leprosy  and  demoniac  possession  were  wrought  by  his  word.  All 
this  wealth  and  prodigality  of  superfluous,  aimless,  and  unmeaning 
miracle — arising  in  part  from  a  mere  craving  for  the  supernatural,  and 
in  part  from  a  fanciful  application  of  Old  Test  iment  prophecies — fur- 
nishes a  strong  contrast  to  the  truthful  simplicity  of  the  Gospel  narra- 
tive. St.  Matthew  neither  tells  us  where  the  Holy  Family  abode  in 
Egypt,  nor  how  long  their  exile  continued ;  but  ancient  legends  say 
that  they  remained  two  years  absent  from  Palestine,  and  lived  at 
Matareeh,  a  few  miles  north-east  of  Cairo,  where  a  fountain  was  long 
shown  of  which  Jesus  had  made  the  water  fresh,  and  an  ancient 
sycamore  under  which  they  had  rested.  The  Evangelist  alludes  only 
to  the  causes  of  their  flight  and  of  their  return,  and  finds  in  the  latter 
a  new  and  deeper  significance  for  the  words'  of  the  prophet  Hosea, 
"  Out  of  Egypt  have  I  called  my  Son." 

The  flight  into  Egypt  led  to  a  very  memorable  event.  Seeing  that 
the  Wise  Men  had  not  returned  to  him,  the  alarm  and  jealousy  of 
Herod  assumed  a  still  darker  and  more  malignant  aspect.  He  had  no 
means  of  identifying  the  royal  infant  of  the  seed  of  David,  and  least 
of  all  would  ho  have  been  likely  to  seek  for  Him  in  the  cavern  stable 
of  the  village  khan.  But  he  knew  that  the  child  whom  the  visit  of 

c 


18  THE   LIFE    OF   CHEIST. 

the  Magi  had  taught  him  to  regard  as  a  future  rival  of  himself  or  of 
his  house  was  yet  an  infant  at  the  breast ;  and  as  Eastern  mothers 
usually  suckle  their  children  for  two  years,  he  issued  his  fell  mandate 
to  slay  all  the  children  of  Bethlehem  and  its  neighbourhood  "from 
two  years  old  and  under."  Of  the  method  by  which  the  decree  was 
carried  out  we  know  nothing.  The  children  may  have  been  slain 
secretly,  gradually,  and  by  various  forms  of  murder ;  or,  as  has  been 
generally  supposed,  there  may  have  been  one  single  hour  of  dreadful 
butchery.  The  decrees  of  tyrants  like  Herod  are  usually  involved  in 
a  deadly  obscurity ;  they  reduce  the  world  to  a  torpor  in  which  it  is 
hardly  safe  to  speak  above  a  whisper.  But  the  wild  wail  of  anguish 
which  rose  from  the  mothers  thus  cruelly  robbed  of  their  infant 
children  could  not  be  hushed,  and  they  who  heard  it  might  well 
imagine  that  Rachel,  the  great  ancestress  of  their  race,  whose  tomb 
stands  by  the  roadside  about  a  mile  from  Bethlehem,  once  more,  as  in 
the  pathetic  image  of  the  prophet,  mingled  her  voice  with  the  mourning 
and  lamentation  of  those  who  wept  so  inconsolably  for  their  murdered 
little  ones. 

To  us  there  seems  something  inconceivable  in  a  crime  so  atrocious ; 
but  our  thoughts  have  been  softened  by  eighteen  centuries  of  Chris- 
tianity, and  such  deeds  are  by  no  means  unparalleled  in  the  history  of 
heathen  despots  and  of  the  ancient  world.  Infanticide  of  a  deeper  dye 
than  this  of  Herod's  was  a  crime  dreadfully  rife  in  the  days  of  the 
Empire;  and  the  Massacre  of  the  Innocents,  as  well  as  the  motives 
which  led  to  it,  can  be  illustrated  by  several  circumstances  in  the 
history  of  this  very  epoch.  Suetonius,  in  his  Life  of  Augustus,  quotes 
from  the  life  of  the  Emperor  by  his  freedman  Julius  Marathus,  a  story 
to  the  effect  that  shortly  before  his  birth  there  was  a  prophecy  in  Rome 
that  a  king  over  the  Roman  people  would  soon  be  born.  To  obviate 
this  danger  to  the  Republic,  the  Senate  ordered  that  all  the  male 
children  born  in  that  year  should  be  abandoned  or  exposed ;  but  the 
Senators  whose  wives  were  pregnant  took  means  to  prevent  the  rati- 
fication of  the  statute,  because  each  of  them  hoped  that  the  prophecy 
might  refer  to  his  own  child.  Again,  Eusebius  quotes  from  Hegesippus, 
a  Jew  by  birth,  a  story  that  Domitian,  alarmed  by  the  growing  power 
of  the  name  of  Christ,  issued  an  order  to  destroy  all  the  descendants  of 
the  house  of  David.  Two  grandchildren  of  St.  Jude — "the  Lord's 
brother  " — were  still  living,  and  were  known  as  the  Desposyni.  They 
were  betrayed  to  the  Emperor  by  a  certain  Jocatus,  and  other 
Nazarsean  heretics,  and  were  brought  into  the  imperial  presence ;  but 
when  Domitian  observed  that  they  only  held  the  rank  of  peasants,  and 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  19 

that  their  hands  were  hard  with  manual  toil,  he  dismissed  them  in 
safety  with  a  mixture  of  pity  and  contempt. 

Although  doubts  have  been  thrown  on  the  Massacre  of  the 
Innocents,  it  is  profoundly  in  accordance  with  all  that  we  know  of 
Herod's  character.  The  master-passions  of  that  able  but  wicked 
prince  were  a  most  unbounded  ambition,  and  a  most  excruciating 
jealousy.  His  whole  career  was  red  with  the  blood  of  murder.  He 
had  massacred  priests  and  nobles ;  he  had  decimated  the  Sanhedrin ; 
he  had  caused  the  High  Priest,  his  brother-in-law,  the  young  and 
noble  Aristobulus,  to  be  drowned  in  pretended  sport  before  his  eyes ; 
lie  had  ordered  the  strangulation  of  his  favourite  wife,  the  beautiful 
Asmonsean  princess  Mariamne,  though  she  seems  to  have  been  the 
only  human  being  whom  he  passionately  loved.  His  sons  Alexander, 
Aristobulus,  and  Antipater — his  uncle  Joseph — Antigonus  and  Alex- 
ander, the  uncle  and  father  of  his  wife — his  mother-in-law  Alexandra 
— his  kinsman  Cortobanus — his  friends  Dositheus  and  Gadias,  were 
but  a  few  of  the  multitudes  who  fell  victims  to  his  sanguinary, 
suspicious,  and  guilty  terrors.  His  brother  Pheroras  and  his  son 
Archelaus  barely  and  narrowly  escaped  execution  by  his  orders. 
Neither  the  blooming  youth  of  the  prince  Aristobulus,  nor  the  white 
hairs  of  the  king  Hyrcanus,  had  protected  them  from  his  fawning  and 
treacherous  fury.  Deaths  by  strangulation,  deaths  by  burning,  deaths 
by  being  cleft  asunder,  deaths  by  secret  assassination,  confessions 
forced  by  unutterable  torture,  acts  of  insolent  and  inhuman  lust,  mark 
the  annals  of  a  reign  which  was  so  cruel  that,  in  the  energetic  language 
of  the  Jewish  ambassadors  to  the  Emperor  Augustus,  "  the  survivors 
during  his  lifetime  were  even  more  miserable  than  the  sufferers."  And 
as  in  the  case  of  Henry  VIII.,  every  dark  and  brutal  instinct  of  his 
character  seemed  to  acquire  fresh  intensity  as  his  life  drew  towards  its 
close.  Haunted  by  the  spectres  of  his  murdered  wife  and  murdered 
sons,  agitated  by  the  conflicting  furies  of  remorse  and  blood,  the  pitiless 
monster,  as  Josephus  calls  him,  was  seized  in  his  last  days  by  a  black 
and  bitter  ferocity,  which  broke  out  against  all  with  whom  he  came  in 
contact.  There  is  no  conceivable  difficulty  in  supposing  that  such  a 
man — a  savage  barbarian  with  a  thin  veneer  of  corrupt  and  superficial 
civilisation — would  have  acted  in  the  exact  manner  which  St.  Matthew 
describes ;  and  the  belief  in  the  fact  receives  independent  confirmation 
from  various  sources.  "  On  Augustus  being  informed,"  says  Macrobius, 
"  that  among  the  boys  under  two  years  of  age  whom  Herod  ordered  to  be 
slain  in  Syria,  his  own  son  also  had  been  slain,"  "  It  is  better,"  said  he, 
"  to  be  Herod's  pig  (vv)  than  his  son  (vibv)"  Although  Macrobius  is 

C  2 


20  THE   LIFE   OP   CHEIST. 

a  late  writer,  and  made  the  mistake  of  supposing  that  Herod's  son 
Antipater,  who  was  put  to  death  about  the  same  time  as  the  Massacre 
of  the  Innocents,  had  actually  perished  in  that  massacre,  it  is  clear  that 
the  form  in  which  he  narrates  the  Ion  mot  of  Augustus,  points  to  some 
dim  reminiscence  of  this  cruel  slaughter. 

Why  then,  it  has  been  asked,  does  Josephus  make  no  mention  of  so 
infamous  an  atrocity  ?  Perhaps  because  it  was  performed  so  secretly 
that  he  did  not  even  know  of  it.  Perhaps  because,  in  those  terrible 
days,  the  murder  of  a  score  of  children,  in  consequence  of  a  transient 
suspicion,  would  have  been  regarded  as  an  item  utterly  insignificant  in 
the  list  of  Herod's  murders.  Perhaps  because  it  was  passed  over  in 
silence  by  Nikolaus  of  Damascus,  who,  waiting  in  the  true  spirit  of 
those  Hellenising  courtiers,  who  wanted  to  make  a  political  Messiah 
out  of  a  corrupt  and  blood-stained  usurper,  magnified  all  his  patron's 
achievements,  and  concealed  or  palliated  all  his  crimes.  But  the  more 
probable  reason  is  that  Josephus,  whom,  in  spite  of  all  the  immense 
literary  debt  which  we  owe  to  him,  we  can  only  regard  as  a  renegade 
and  a  sycophant,  did  not  choose  to  make  any  allusion  to  facts  which 
were  even  remotely  connected  with  the  life  of  Christ.  The  single 
passage  in  which  he  alludes  to  Him  is  interpolated,  if  not  wholly 
spurious,  and  no  one  can  doubt  that  his  silence  on  the  subject  of 
Christianity  was  as  deliberate  as  it  was  dishonest. 

But  although  Josephus  does  not  distinctly  mention  the  event,  yet 
every  single  circumstance  which  he  does  tell  us  about  this  very  period 
of  Herod's  life  supports  its  probability.  At  this  very  time  two  eloquent 
Jewish  teachers,  Judas  and  Matthias,  had  incited  their  scholars  to  pull 
down  the  large  golden  eagle  which  Herod  had  placed  above  the  great  gate 
of  the  Temple.  Josephus  connects  this  bold  attempt  with  premature 
rumours  of  Herod's  death ;  but  Lardner's  conjecture  that  it  may  have 
been  further  encouraged  by  the  Messianic  hopes  freshly  kindled  by 
the  visit  of  the  Wise  Men,  is  by  no  means  impossible.  The  attempt, 
however,  was  defeated,  and  Judas  and  Matthias,  with  forty  of  their 
scholars,  were  burned  alive.  With  such  crimes  as  this  before  him  on 
every  page,  Josephus  might  well  have  ignored  the  secret  assassination 
of  a  few  unweaned  infants  in  a  little  village.  Their  blood  was  but  a 
drop  in  that  crimson  river  in  which  Herod  was  steeped  to  the  very  lips. 

It  must  have  been  very  shortly  after  the  murder  of  the  Innocents 
that  Herod  died.  Only  five  days  before  his  death  he  had  made  a 
frantic  attempt  at  suicide,  and  had  ordered  the  execution  of  his  eldest 
son  Antipater.  His  death-bed,  which  once  more  reminds  us  of 
Henry  VIII.,  was  accompanied  by  circumstances  of  peculiar  horror, 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  21 

and  it  has  been  noticed  that  the  loathsome  disease  of  which  he  died  is 
hardly  mentioned  in  history,  except  in  the  case  of  men  who  have  been 
rendered  infamous  by  an  atrocity  of  persecuting  zeal.  On  his  bed  of 
intolerable  anguish,  in  that  splendid  and  luxurious  palace  which  he 
had  built  for  himself  under  the  palms  of  Jericho,  swollen  with  disease 
and  scorched  by  thirst — ulcerated  externally  and  glowing  inwardly 
with  a  "  soft  slow  fire  " — surrounded  by  plotting  sons  and  plundering 
slaves,  detesting  all  and  detested  by  all — longing  for  death  as  a  release 
from,  his  tortures,  yet  dreading  it  as  the  beginning  of  worse  terrors — 
stung  by  remorse,  yet  still  unslaked  with  murder — a  horror  to  all 
around  him,  yet  in  his  guilty  conscience  a  worse  terror  to  himself — 
devoured  by  the  premature  corruption  of  an  anticipated  grave — eaten 
of  worms  as  though  visibly  smitten  by  the  finger  of  God's  wrath,  after 
seventy  years  of  successful  villany — the  wretched  old  man,  whom  men 
had  called  the  Great,  lay  in  savage  frenzy  awaiting  his  last  hour.  As 
he  knew  that  none  would  shed  one  tear  for  him,  he  determined  that 
they  should  shed  many  for  themselves,  and  issued  an  order  that,  under 
pain  of  death,  the  principal  families  in  the  kingdom  and  the  chiefs  of 
the  tribes  should  come  to  Jericho.  They  came,  and  then,  shutting 
them  in  the  hippodrome,  he  secretly  commanded  his  sister  Salome  that 
at  the  moment  of  his  death  they  should  all  be  massacred.  And  so, 
choking  as  it  were  with  blood,  devising  massacres  in  its  very  delirium, 
the  soul  of  Herod  passed  forth  into  the  night. 

In  purple  robes,  with  crown  and  sceptre  and  precious  stones,  the 
corpse  was  placed  upon  its  splendid  bier,  and  accompanied  with 
military  pomp  and  burning  incense  to  its  grave  in  the  Herodium,  not 
far  from  the  place  where  Christ  was  born.  But  the  spell  of  the 
Herodian  dominion  was  broken,  and  the  people  saw  how  illusory  had 
been  its  glittering  fascination.  The  day  of  Herod's  death  was,  as  he 
had  foreseen,  observed  as  a  festival.  His  will  was  disputed  ;  his  king- 
dom disintegrated  ;  his  last  order  was  disobeyed ;  his  sons  died  for  the 
most  part  in  infamy  and  exile ;  the  curse  of  God  was  on  his  house,  and 
though,  by  ten  wives  and  many  concubines,  he  seems  to  have  had  nine 
sons  and  five  daughters,  yet  within  a  hundred  years  the  family  of  the 
liierodoulos  of  Ascalon  had  perished  by  disease  or  violence,  and  there 
was  no  living  descendant  to  perpetuate  his  name. 

If  the  intimation  of  Herod's  death  was  speedily  given  to  Joseph, 
the  stay  in  Egypt  must  have  been  too  short  to  influence  in  any  way  the 
human  development  of  our  Lord.  This  may  perhaps  be  the  reason 
why  St.  Luke  passes  it  over  in  silence. 

It  seems  to  have  been  the  first  intention  of  Joseph  to  fix  his  homo 


22  THE   LIFE    OP   CHRIST. 

in  Bethlehem.  It  was  the  city  of  his  ancestors,  and  was  hallowed  by 
many  beautiful  and  heroic  associations.  It  would  have  been  easy  to 
find  a  living  there  by  a  trade  which  must  almost  anywhere  have 
supplied  the  simple  wants  of  a  peasant  family.  It  is  true  that  an 
Oriental  rarely  leaves  his  home,  but  when  he  has  been  compelled  by 
circumstances  to  do  so,  he  finds  it  comparatively  easy  to  settle  else- 
where. Having  once  been  summoned  to  Bethlehem,  Joseph  might 
find  a  powerful  attraction  in  the  vicinity  of  the  little  town  to  Jerusalem ; 
and  the  more  so  since  it  had  recently  been  the  scene  of  such  memor- 
able circumstances.  But,  on  his  way,  he  was  met  by  the  news  that 
Archelaus  ruled  in  the  room  of  his  father  Herod.  The  people  would 
only  too  gladly  have  got  rid  of  the  whole  Idumsean  race  :  at  the  worst 
they  would  have  preferred  Antipas  to  Archelaus.  But  Augustus  had 
unexpectedly  decided  in  favour  of  Archelaus,  who,  though  younger 
than  Antipas,  was  the  heir  nominated  by  the  last  will  of  his  father ; 
and  as  though  anxious  to  show  that  he  was  the  true  son  of  that  father, 
Archelaus,  even  before  his  inheritance  had  been  confirmed  by  Roman 
authority,  "had,"  as  Josephus  scornfully  remarks,  "given  to  his 
subjects  a  specimen  of  his  future  virtue,  by  ordering  a  slaughter  of 
3,000  of  his  own  countrymen  at  the  Temple."  It  was  clear  that  under 
such  a  government  there  could  be  neither  hope  nor  safety;  and 
Joseph,  obedient  once  more  to  an  intimation  of  God's  will,  seeking 
once  more  the  original  home  of  himself  and  Mary,  "  turned  aside  into 
the  parts  of  Galilee,"  where,  in  remote  obscurity,  sheltered  by  poverty 
and  insignificance,  the  Holy  Family  might  live  secure  under  the  sway 
of  another  son  of  Herod — the  equally  unscrupulous,  but  more  indolent 
and  indifferent  Antipas. 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE    BOYHOOD   OF  JESUS. 


THE  physical  geography  of  Palestine  is,  perhaps,  more  distinctly 
marked  than  that  of  any  other  country  in  the  world.  Along  the  shore 
of  the  Mediterranean  runs  the  Shephelah  and  the  maritime  plain, 
broken  only  by  the -bold  spur  of  Mount  Carmel ;  parallel  to  this  is  a 
long  range  of  hills,  for  the  most  part  rounded  and  featureless  in  their 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  23 

character ;  these,  on  their  eastern  side,  plunge  into  the  deep  declivity 
of  El  Gh6r,  the  Jordan  valley  ;  and  beyond  the  Jordan  valley  runs  the 
straight,  -unbroken,  purple  line  of  the  mountains  of  Moab  and  Gilead. 
Thus  the  character  of  the  country  from  north  to  south  may  be  repre- 
sented by  four  parallel  bands — the  Sea-board,  the  Hill  country,  the 
Jordan  valley,  and  the  Trans-Jordanic  range. 

The  Hill  country,  which  thus  occupies  the  space  between  the  low 
maritime  plain  and  the  deep  Jordan  valley,  falls  into  two  great  masses, 
the  continuity  of  the  low  mountain-range  being  broken  by  the  plain  of 
Jezreel.  The  southern  mass  of  those  limestone  hills  formed  the  land 
of  Judea  ;  the  northern,  the  land  of  Galilee. 

Gdlil,  in  Hebrew,  means  "  a  circle,"  and  the  name  was  originally 
applied  to  the  twenty  cities  in  the  circuit  of  Kedesh-Naphtali,  which 
Solomon  gave  to  Hiram  in  return  for  his  services  in  transporting 
timber,  and  to  which  Hiram,  in  extreme  disgust,  applied  the  name 
of  Cabuly  or  "  disgusting."  Thus  it  seems  to  have  been  always  the 
destiny  of  Galilee  to  be  despised ;  and  that  contempt  was  likely 
to  be  fostered  in  the  minds  of  the  Jews  from  th«  fact  that  this 
district  became,  from  very  early  days,  the  residence  of  a  mixed  popu- 
lation, and  was  distinguished  as  "  Galilee  of  the  Gentiles."  Not  only 
were  there  many  Phoenicians  and  Arabs  in  the  cities  of  Galilee,  but, 
in  th,e  time  of  our  Lord,  there  were  also  many  Greeks,  and  the  Greek 
language  was  currently  spoken  and  understood. 

The  bills  which  form  the  northern  limit  of  the  plain  of  Jezreel 
run  almost  due  east  and  west  from  the  Jordan  valley  to  the  Mediter- 
ranean, and  their  southern  slopes  were  in  the  district  assigned  to  the 
tribe  of  Zebulun. 

Almost  in  the  centre  of  this  chain  of  hills  there  is  a  singular  cleft 
in  the  limestone,  forming  the  entrance  to  a  little  valley.  As  the 
traveller  leaves  the  plain  he  will  ride  up  a  steep  and  narrow  pathway, 
broidered  with  grass  and  flowers,  through  scenery  which  is  neither 
colossal  nor  overwhelming,  but  infinitely  beautiful  and  picturesque. 
Beneath  him,  on  the  right  hand  side,  the  vale  will  gradually  widen, 
until  it  becomes  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  in  breadth.  The  basin  of 
the  valley  is  divided  by  hedges  of  cactus  into  little  fields  and  gardens, 
which,  about  the  fall  of  the  spring  rains,  wear  an  aspect  of  indescrib- 
able calm,  and  glow  with  a  tint  of  the  richest  green.  Beside  the 
narrow  pathway,  at  no  great  distance  apart  from  each  other,  are  two 
wells,  and  the  women  who  draw  water  there  are  more  beautiful,  and 
the  ruddy,  bright-eyed  shepherd-boys  who  sit  or  play  by  the  well- 
sides,  in  their  gay-coloured  Oriental  costume,  are  a  happier,  bolder, 


24  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

brighter-looking  race  than  the  traveller  will  have  seen  elsewhere. 
Gradually  the  valley  opens  into  a  little  natural  amphitheatre  of  hills, 
supposed  by  some  to  be  the  crater  of  an  extinct  volcano ;  and  there, 
clinging  to  the  hollows  of  a  hill,  which  rises  to  the  height  of  somo 
five  hundred  feet  above  it,  lie,  "like  a  handful  of  pearls  in  a  goblefc 
of  emerald,"  the  flat  roofs  and  narrow  streets  of  a  little  Eastern 
town.  There  is  a  small  church:  the  massive  buildings  of  a  convent; 
the  tall  minaret  of  a  mosque;  a  clear,  abundant  fountain;  houses 
built  of  white  stone,  and  gardens  scattered  among  them,  umbrageous 
with  figs  and  olives,  and  rich  with  the  white  and  scarlet  blossoms  of 
orange  and  pomegranate.  In  spring,  at  least,  everything  about  the 
place  looks  indescribably  bright  and  soft ;  doves  murmur  in  the  trees  ; 
the  hoopoe  flits  about  in  ceaseless  activity;  the  bright  blue  roller- 
bird,  the  commonest  and  loveliest  bird. of  Palestine,  flashes  like  a 
living  sapphire  over  fields  which  are  enamelled  with  innumerable 
flowers.  And  that  little  town  is  En  Ndzirali,  Nazareth,  where  the 
Son  of  God,  the  Saviour  of  mankind,  spent  nearly  thirty  years  of 
His  mortal  life.  It  was,  in  fact,  His  home,  His  native  village  for  all 
but  three  or  four  years  of  His  life  on  earth ;  the  village  which  lent 
its  then  ignominious  name  to  the  scornful  title  written  upon  His 
cross ;  the  village  from  which  he  did  not  disdain  to  draw  His  appella- 
tion when  he  spake  in  vision  to  the  persecuting  Saul.  And  along 
the  narrow  mountain-path  which  I  have  described,  His  feet  must  have 
often  trod,  for  it  is  the  only  approach  by  which,  in  returning  north- 
wards from  Jerusalem,  He  could  have  reached  the  home  of  Hi3 
infancy,  youth,  and  manhood. 

What  was  His  manner  of  life  during  those  thirty  years  ?  It  is  a 
question  which  the  Christian  cannot  help  asking  in  deep  reverence, 
and  with  yearning  love ;  but  the  words  in  which  the  Gospels  answer 
it  are  very  calm  and  very  few. 

Of  the  four  Evangelists,  St.  John,  the  beloved  disciple,  and  St. 
Mark,  the  friend  and  "  son  "  of  St.  Peter,  pass  over  these  thirty  years 
in  absolute,  unbroken  silence.  St.  Matthew  devotes  one  chapter  to 
the  visit  of  the  Magi  and  the  Flight  into  Egypt,  and  then  proceeds  to 
the  preaching  of  the  Baptist.  St.  Luke  alone,  after  describing  the 
incidents  which  marked  the  presentation  in  the  Temple,  preserves 
for  us  one  inestimable  anecdote  of  the  Saviour's  boyhood,  and  one 
inestimable  verso  descriptive  of  His  growth  till  He  was  twelve 
years  old.  And  that  verse  contains  nothing  for  the  gratification  of 
our  curiosity ;  it  furnishes  us  with  no  details  of  life,  no  incidents  of 
adventure ;  it  tells  us  only  how,  in  a  sweet  and  holy  childhood,  "  the 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  25 

child  grew  and  waxed  strong  in  spirit,  filled  with,  wisdom,  and  the 
grace  of  God  was  upoa  Him."  To  this  period  of  His  life,  too,  we  may 
apply  the  subsequent  verse,  "And  Jesus  increased  in  wisdom  and 
stature,  and  in  favour  with  God  and  man."  His  development  was  a 
strictly  human  development.  Ho  did  not  come  into  the  world 
endowed  with  infinite  knowledge,  but,  as  St.  Luke  tells  us,  "He 
gradually  advanced  in  wisdom."  He  was  not  clothed  with  infinite 
power,  but  experienced  the  weaknesses  and  imperfections  of  human 
infancy.  He  grew  as  other  children  grow,  only  in  a  childhood  of 
stainless  and  sinless  beauty — "  as  the  flower  of  roses  in  the  spring  of 
the  year,  and  as  lilies  by  the  waters." 

There  is,  then,  for  the  most  part  a  deep  silence  in  the  Evangelists 
respecting  this  period ;  but  what  eloquence  in  their  silence  !  May  we 
not  find  in  their  very  reticence  a  wisdom  and  an  instruction  more 
profound  than  if  they  had  filled  many  volumes  with  minor  details  ? 

In  the  first  place,  we  may  see  in  this  their  silence  a  signal  and 
striking  confirmation  of  their  faithfulness.  We  may  learn  from  it 
that  they  desired  to  tell  the  simple  truth,  and  not  to  construct  an 
astonishing  or  plausible  narrative.  That  Christ  should  have  passed 
thirty  years  of  His  brief  life  in  the  deep  obscurity  of  a  provincial 
village  ;  that  He  should  have  been  brought  up  not  only  in  a  con- 
quered land,  but  in  its  most  despised  province  ;  not  only  in  a  despised 
province,  but  in  its  most  disregarded  valley;  that  during  all  those 
thirty  years  the  ineffable  brightness  of  His  divine  nature  should  have 
tabernacled  among  us,  "  in  a  tent  like  ours,  and  of  the  same  material," 
unnoticed  and  unknown ;  that  during  those  long  years  there  should 
have  been  no  flash  of  splendid  circumstance,  no  outburst  of  amazing 
miracle,  no  "  sevenfold  chorus  of  hallelujahs  and  harping  symphonies" 
to  announce,  and  reveal,  and  glorify  the  coming  King — this  is  not 
what  we  should  have  expected — not  what  any  one  would  have  been 
likely  to  imagine  or  to  invent. 

We  should  not  have  expected  it,  but  it  was  so ;  and  therefore  the 
Evangelists  leave  it  so  ;  and  the  very  fact  of  its  contradicting  all  that 
we  should  have  imagined  is  an  additional  proof  that  so  it  must  have 
been.  An  additional  proof,  because  the  Evangelists  must  inevitably 
have  been — as,  indeed,  we  know  that  they  were — actuated  by  the  same 
a  priori  anticipations  as  ourselves ;  and  had  there  been  any  glorious 
circumstances  attending  the  boyhood  of  our  Lord,  they,  as  honest 
witnesses,  would  certainly  have  told  us  of  them ;  and  had  they  not 
been  honest  witnesses,  they  would — if  none  such  occurred  in  reality — 
have  most  certainly  invented  them.  But  man's  ways  are  not  as 


26  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

God's  ways ;  and  because  the  truth  -which  by  their  very  silence  the 
Evangelists  record  is  a  revelation  to  us  of  the  ways  of  God,  and  not 
of  man,  therefore  it  contradicts  what  we  should  have  invented ;  it 
disappoints  what,  without  further  enlightenment,  we  should  have 
desired.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  it  fulfils  the  ideal  of  ancient 
prophecy,  "He  shall  grow  up  before  him  as  a  tender  plant,  and  as  a 
root  out  of  a  dry  ground ; "  and  it  is  in  accordance  with  subsequent 
allusion,  "He  made  Himself  of  no  reputation,  and  took  upon  Him  the 
form  of  a  servant." 

We  have  only  to  turn  to  the  Apocryphal  Gospels,  and  we  shall  find 
how  widely  different  is  the  false  human  ideal  from  the  divine  fact. 
There  we  shall  see  how,  following  their  natural  and  unspiritual  bent, 
the  fabulists  of  Christendom,  whether  heretical  or  orthodox,  surround 
Christ's  boyhood  with  a  blaze  of  miracle,  make  it  portentous,  terror- 
striking,  unnatural,  repulsive.  It  is  surely  an  astonishing  proof  that 
the  Evangelists  were  guided  by  the  Spirit  of  God  in  telling  how  He 
lived  in  whom  God  was  revealed  to  man,  when  we  gradually  discover 
that  no  profane,  no  irreverent,  even  no  imaginative  hand  can  touch 
the  sacred  outlines  of  that  divine  and  perfect  picture  without  de- 
grading and  distorting  it.  Whether  the  Apocryphal  writers  meant 
their  legends  to  be  accepted  as  history  or  as  fiction,  it  is  at  least 
certain  that  in  most  cases  they  meant  to  weave  around  the  brows  of 
Christ  a  garland  of  honour.  Yet  how  do  their  stories  dwarf,  and 
dishonour,  and  misinterpret  Him  !  How  infinitely  superior  is  the 
noble  simplicity  of  that  evangelic  silence  to  all  the  theatrical  displays 
of  childish  and  meaningless  omnipotence  with  which  the  Protevan- 
gelium,  and  the  Pseudo-Matthew,  and  the  Arabic  Gospel  of  the 
Infancy  are  full!  They  meant  to  honour  Christ;  but  no  invention 
COM  honour  Him ;  he  who  invents  about  Him  degrades  Him  ;  he  mixes 
the  weak,  imperfect,  erring  fancies  of  man  with  the  unapproachable 
and  awful  purposes  of  God.  The  boy  Christ  of  the  Gospels  is  simple 
and  sweet,  obedient  and  humble ;  He  is  subject  to  His  parents ;  He 
is  occupied  solely  with  the  quiet  duties  of  His  home  and  of  His  age ; 
He  loves  all  men,  and  all  men  love  the  pure,  and  gracious,  and  noble 
child.  Already  He  knows  God  as  His  Father,  and  the  favour  of  God 
falls  on  Him  softly  as  the  morning  sun-light  or  tha  dew  of  heaven, 
and  plays  like  an  invisible  aureole  round  His  infantile  and  saintly 
brow.  Unseen,  save  in  the  beauty  of  heaven,  but  yet  covered  with 
silver  wings,  and  with  its  feathers  like  gold,  the  Spirit  of  God 
descended  like  a  dove,  and  rested  from  infancy  upon  the  Holy  Child. 

But  how  different  is  the  boy  Christ  of  the  New  Testament  Apo- 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHEIST.  27 

crypha  !  He  is  mischievous,  petulant,  forward,  revengeful.  Some  of 
the  marvels  told  of  Him  are  simply  aimless  and  puerile — as  when  He 
carries  the  spilt  water  in  His  robe ;  or  pulls  the  short  board  to  the 
requisite  length ;  or  moulds  sparrows  of  clay,  and  then  claps  His 
hand  to  make  them  fly;  or  throws  all  the  cloth  into  the  dyer's  vat,  and 
then  draws  them  out  each  stained  of  the  requisite  colour.  But  some 
are,  on  the  contrary,  simply  distasteful  and  inconsiderate,  as  when  He 
vexes  and  shames  and  silences  those  who  wish  to  teach  Him ;  or 
rebukes  Joseph;  or  turns  His  playmates  into  kids:  and  others  are 
simply  cruel  and  blasphemous,  as  when  He  strikes  dead  with  a  curse 
the  boys  who  offend  or  run  against  Him,  until  at  last  there  is  a  storm 
of  popular  indignation,  and  Mary  is  afraid  to  let  Him  leave  the  house. 
In  a  careful  search  through  all  these  heavy,  tasteless,  and  frequently 
pernicious  fictions,  I  can  find  but  one  anecdote  in  which  there  is  a 
touch  of  feeling  or  possibility  of  truth ;  and  this  alone  I  will  quote, 
because  it  is  at  any  rate  harmless,  and  it  is  quite  conceivable  that  it 
may  rest  upon  some  slight  basis  of  traditional  fact.  It  is  from  the 
Arabic  Gospel  of  the  Infancy,  and  runs  as  follows  : — 

"Now  in  the  month  of  Adar,  Jesus  assembled  the  boys  as  if  He 
were  their  king ;  they  strewed  their  garments  on  the  ground,  and  He 
sat  upon  them.  Then  they  put  on  His  head  a  crown  wreathed  of 
flowers,  and,  like  attendants  waiting  upon  a  king,  they  stood  in  order 
before  Him  on  His  right  hand  and  on  His  left.  And  whoever  passed 
that  way  the  boys  took  him  by  force,  crying,  '  Come  hither  and  adore 
the  Bang,  and  then  proceed  upon  thy  way.'  " 

Yet  I  am  not  sure  that  the  sacredness  of  the  evangelic  silence  is 
not  rudely  impaired  even  by  so  simple  a  fancy  as  this  :  for  it  was  in 
utter  stillness,  in  prayerfulness,  in  the  quiet  round  of  daily  duties — 
like  Moses  in  the  wilderness,  like  David  among  the  sheep-folds,  like 
Elijah  among  the  tents  of  the  Bedawin,  like  Jeremiah  in  his  quiet 
home  at  Anathoth,  like  Amos  in  the  sycamore  groves  of  Tekoa — that 
the  boy  Jesus  prepared  Himself,  amid  a  hallowed  obscurity,  for  His 
mighty  work  on  earth.  His  outward  life  was  the  life  of  all  those  of 
His  age,  and  station,  and  place  of  birth.  He  lived  as  lived  the  other 
children  of  peasant  parents  in  that  quiet  town,  and  in  great  measure 
as  they  live  now.  He  who  has  seen  the  children  of  Nazareth  in  their 
red  caftans,  and  bright  tunics  of  silk  or  cloth,  girded  with  a  many- 
coloured  sash,  and  sometimes  covered  with  a  loose  outer  jacket  of 
white  or  blue — he  who  has  watched  their  noisy  and  merry  games,  and 
heard  their  ringing  laughter  as  they  wander  about  the  hills  of  their 
little  native  vale,  or  play  in  bands  on  the  hill-side  beside  their  sweet 


28  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

and  abundant  fountain,  may  perhaps  form  some  conception  of  how 
Jesus  looked  and  played  when  He  too  was  a  child.  And  the  traveller 
who  has  followed  any  of  those  children — as  I  have  done — to  their 
simple  homes,  and  seen  the  scanty  furniture,  the  plain  but  sweet  and 
wholesome  food,  the  uneventful,  happy  patriarchal  life,  may  form  a 
vivid  conception  of  the  manner  in  which  Jesus  lived.  Nothing  can  be 
plainer  than  those  houses,  with  the  doves  sunning  themselves  on  the 
white  roofs,  and  the  vines  wreathing  about  them.  The  mats,  or 
carpets,  are  laid  loose  along  the  walls ;  shoes  and  sandals  are  taken  off 
at  the  threshold ;  from  the  centre  hangs  a  lamp  which  forms  the  only 
ornament  of  the  room ;  in  some  recess  in  the  wall  is  placed  the  wooden 
chest,  painted  with  bright  colours,  which  contains  the  books  or  other 
possessions  of  the  family  ;  on  a  ledge  that  runs  round  the  wall,  within 
easy  reach,  are  neatly  rolled  up  the  gay-coloured  quilts,  which  serve  as 
beds,  and  on  the  same  ledge  are  ranged  the  earthen  vessels  for  daily 
use  ;  near  the  door  stand  the  large  common  water-jars  of  red  clay  with 
a  few  twigs  and  green  leaves — often  of  aromatic  shrubs — thrust  into 
their  orifices  to  keep  the  water  cool.  At  meal-time  a  painted  wooden 
stool  is  placed  in  the  centre  of  the  apartment,  a  large  tray  is  put  upon 
it,  and  in  the  middle  of  the  tray  stands  the  dish  of  rice  and  meat, 
or  libbdn,  or  stewed  fruits,  from  which  all  help  themselves  in  common. 
Both  before  and  after  the  meal  the  servant,  or  the  youngest  member  of 
the  family,  pours  water  over  the  hands  from  a  brazen  §wer  into  a 
brazen  bowl.  So  quiet,  so  simple,  so  humble,  so  uneventful  was  the 
outward  life  of  the  family  of  Nazareth. 

The  reverent  devotion  and  brilliant  fancy  of  the  early  mediaeval 
painters  have  elaborated  a  very  different  picture.  The  gorgeous 
pencils  of  a  Giotto  and  a  Fra  Angelico  have  painted  the  Virgin  and  her 
Child  seated  on  stately  thrones,  upon  floors  of  splendid  mosaic,  under 
canopies  of  blue  and  gold  ;  they  have  robed  them  in  colours  rich  as  the 
hues  of  summer  or  delicate  as  the  flowers  of  spring,  and  fitted  the 
edges  of  their  robes  with  golden  embroidery,  and  clasped  them  with 
priceless  gems.  Far  different  was  the  reality.  When  Joseph  returned 
to  Nazareth  he  knew  well  that  they  were  going  into  seclusion  as  well 
as  into  safety;  and  that  the  life  of  the  Virgin  and  the  Holy  Child 
would  be  spent,  not  in  the  full  light  of  notoriety  or  wealth,  but  in 
secrecy,  in  poverty,  and  in  manual  toil. 

Tct  this  poverty  was  not  pauperism  ;  there  was  nothing  in  it  either 
miserable  or  abject ;  it  was  sweet,  simple,  contented,  happy,  even 
joyous.  Mary,  like  others  of  her  rank,  would  spin,  and  cook  food,  and 
go  to  buy  fruit,  and  evening  by  evening  visit  the  fountain,  still  called 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHKIST.  29 

after  her  "the  Virgin's  fountain,"  with  her  pitcher  of  earthenware 
carried  on  her  shoulder  or  her  head.  Jesus  would  play,  and  learn,  and 
help  His  parents  in  their  daily  tasks,  and  visit  the  synagogues  on  the 
Sabbath  days.  "  It  is  written,"  says  Luther,  "  that  there  was  once  a 
pious  godly  bishop,  who  had  often  earnestly  prayed  that  God  would 
manifest  to  him  what  Jesus  had  done  in  His  youth.  Once  the  bishop 
had  a  dream,  to  this  effect.  He  seemed  in  his  sleep  to  see  a  carpenter 
working  at  his  trade,  and  beside  him  a  little  boy  who  was  gathering  up 
chips.  Then  came  in  a  maiden  clothed  in  green,  who  called  them  both 
to  come  to  the  meal,  and  set  porridge  before  them.  All  this  the  bishop 
seemed  to  see  in  his  dream,  himself  standing  behind  the  door  that  he 
might  not  be  perceived.  Then  the  little  boy  began  and  said,  '  Why 
does  that  man  stand  there  ?  shall  he  not  also  eat  with  us  ?  '  And  this 
so  frightened  the  bishop  that  he  awoke."  "  Let  this  be  what  it  may," 
adds  Luther,  "  a  true  history  or  a  fable,  I  none  the  less  believe  that 
Christ  in  His  childhood  and  youth  looked  and  acted  like  other  children 
yet  without  sin,  in  fashion  like  a  man." 

St.  Matthew  tells  us,  that  in  the  settlement  of  the  Holy  Family  at 
Nazareth,  was  fulfilled  that  which  was  spoken  by  the  prophets,  "  Ho 
shall  be  called  a  Nazarene."  It  is  well-known  that  no  such  passage 
occurs  in  any  extant  prophecy.  If  the  name  implied  a  contemptuous 
dislike — as  may  be  inferred  from  the  proverbial  question  of  Nathanael, 
"  Can  any  good  thing  come  out  of  Nazareth  ?  " — then  St.  Matthew  may 
be  summing  up  in  that  expression  the  various  prophecies  so  little  under- 
stood by  his  nation,  which  pointed  to  the  Messiah  as  a  man  of  sorrows. 
And  certainly  to  this  day  "  Nazarene  "  has  continued  to  be  a  term  of 
contempt.  The  Talmudists  always  speak  of  Jesus  as  "  Ha-nozeri ; " 
Julian  is  said  to  have  expressly  decreed  that  Christians  should  be 
called  by  the  less  honourable  appellation  of  Galilsoans  ;  and  to  this  day 
the  Christians  of  Palestine  are  known  by  no  other  title  than  Nusara. 
But  the  explanation  which  refers  St.  Matthew's  allusion  to  those 
passages  of  prophecy  in  which  Christ  is  called  "  the  Branch " 
(itijtser,  T!»)  seems  far  more  probable.  The  village  may  have  derived 
this  name  from  no  other  circumstance  than  its  abundant  foliage ;  but 
the  Old  Testament  is  full  of  proofs  that  the  Hebrews — who  in  philology 
accepted  the  views  of  the  Analogists — attached  immense  and  mystical 
importance  to  mere  resemblances  in  the  sound  of  words.  To  mention  but 
one  single  instance,  the  first  chapter  of  the  prophet  Micah  turns  almost 
entirely  on  such  merely  external  similarities  in  what,  for  lack  of  a 
better  term,  I  can  only  call  the  physiological  quantity  of  sounds.  St. 
Matthew,  a  Hebrew  of  the  Hebrews,  would  without  any  hesitation 


30  THE   LIFE   OP  CHRIST. 

have  seen  a  prophetic  fitness  in  Christ's  residence  at  this  town  of 
Galilee,  because  its  name  recalled  the  title  by  which  He  was  addressed 
in  the  prophecy  of  Isaiah. 

"  Shall  the  Christ  come  out  of  Galilee  ?  "  asked  the  wondering 
people.  "  Search  and  look  !  "  said  the  Rabbis  to  Nicodemus,  "  for  out 
of  Galilee  ariseth  no  prophet "  (John  vii.  41,  52) .  It  would  not  have 
needed  very  deep  searching  or  looking  to  find  that  these  words  were 
ignorant  or  false ;  for  not  to  speak  of  Barak  the  deliverer,  and  Elon 
the  judge,  and  Anna  the  prophetess,  three,  if  not  four,  of  the  prophets 
— and  those  prophets  of  the  highest  eminence,  Jonah,  Elijah,  Hosea, 
and  Nahum — had  been  born,  or  had  exercised  much  of  their  ministry, 
in  the  precincts  of  Galilee.  And  in  spite  of  the  supercilious  contempt 
with  which  it  was  regarded,  the  little  town  of  Nazareth,  situated  as  it 
was  in  a  healthy  and  secluded  valley,  yet  close  upon  the  confines  of 
great  nations,  and  in  the  centre  of  a  mixed  population,  was  eminently 
fitted  to  be  the  home  of  our  Saviour's  childhood,  the  scene  of  that 
quiet  growth  "  in  wisdom,  and  stature,  and  favour  with  God  and 
man." 


CHAPTER  VI. 

JESUS    IN    THE    TEMPLE. 

EVEN  as  there  is  one  hemisphere  of  the  lunar  surface  on  which,  in  its 
entirety,  no  human  eye  has  ever  gazed,  while  at  the  same  time  the 
moon's  librations  enable  us  to  conjecture  of  its  general  character  and 
appearance,  so  there  is  one  large  portion  of  our  Lord's  life  respecting 
which  there  is  no  full  record;  yet  such  glimpses  are,  as  it  were, 
accorded  to  us  of  its  outer  edge,  that  from  these  we  are  able  to  under- 
stand the  nature  of  the  whole. 

Again,  when  the  moon  is  in  crescent,  a  few  bright  points  are 
visible  through  the  telescope  upon  its  unilluminated  part;  those 
bright  points  are  mountain  peaks,  so  lofty  that  they  catch  the  sun- 
light. One  such  point  of  splendour  and  majesty  is  revealed  to  us  in 
the  otherwise  unknown  region  of  Christ's  youthful  years,  and  it  is 
sufficient  to  furnish  us  with  a  real  insight  into  that  entire  portion  of 
His  life.  In  modern  language  we  should  call  it  an  anecdote  of  the 
Saviour's  confirmation. 


THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  31 

The  age  of  twelve  years  was  a  critical  age  for  a  Jewish  boy.  It 
was  the  age  at  which,  according  to  Jewish  legend,  Moses  had  left  the 
house  of  Pharaoh's  daughter ;  and  Samuel  had  heard  the  Voice  which 
summoned  him  to  the  prophetic  office ;  and  Solomon  had  given  the 
judgment  which  first  revealed  his  possession  of  wisdom ;  and  Josiah 
had  first  dreamed  of  his  great  reform.  At  this  age  a  boy  of  whatever 
rank  was  obliged,  by  the  injunction  of  the  Rabbis  and  the  custom  of 
his  nation,  to  learn  a  trade  for  his  own  support.  At  this  age  he  was 
so  far  emancipated  from  parental  authority  that  his  parents  could  no 
longer  sell  him  as  a  slave.  At  this  age  he  became  a  ben  hat-torah,  or 
"  son  of  the  Law."  Up  to  this  age  he  was  called  katon,  or  "  little ; " 
henceforth  he  was  gadol,  or  "  grown  up,"  and  was  treated  more  as  a 
man ;  henceforth,  too,  he  began  to  wear  the  tephillin,  or  "  phylac- 
teries," and  was  presented  by  his  father  in  the  synagogue  on  a 
Sabbath,  -which  was  called  from  this  circumstance  the  shabbath 
tephiltin.  Nay,  more,  according  to  one  Rabbinical  treatise,  the  Sepher 
Gilgulim,  up  to  this  age  a  boy  only  possessed  the  nephesh,  or  animal 
life ;  but  henceforth  he  began  to  acquire  the  ruach,  or  spirit,  which,  if 
his  life  were  virtuous,  would  develop,  at  the  age  of  twenty,  into  the 
nishema,  or  reasonable  soul. 

This  period,  too — the  completion  of  the  twelfth  year — formed  a 
decisive  epoch  in  a  Jewish  boy's  education.  According  to  Juda  Ben 
Tema,  at  five  he  was  to  study  the  Scriptures  (Mikra),  at  ten  the 
Mishna,  at  thirteen  the  Talmud ;  at  eighteen  he  was  to  marry,  at 
twenty  to  acquire  riches,  at  thirty  strength,  at  forty  prudence,  and  so 
on  to  the  end.  Nor  must  we  forget,  in  considering  this  narrative, 
that  the  Hebrew  race,  and,  indeed,  Orientals  generally,  develop  with  a 
precocity  unknown  among  ourselves,  and  that  boys  of  this  age  (as  we 
learn  from  Josephus)  could  and  did  fight  in  battle,  and  that,  to  the 
great  detriment  of  the  race,  it  is,  to  this  day,  regarded  as  a  marriage- 
able age  among  the  Jews  of  Palestine  and  Asia  Minor. 

Now  it  was  the  custom  of  the  parents  of  our  Lord  to  visit  Jeru- 
salem every  year  at  the  feast  of  the  Passover.  Women  were,  indeed, 
not  mentioned  in  the  law  which  required  the  annual  presence  of  all 
males  at  the  three  great  yearly  feasts  of  Passover,  Pentecost,  and 
Tabernacles ;  but  Mary,  in  pious  observance  of  the  rule  recommended 
by  Hillel,  accompanied  her  husband  every  year,  and  on  this  occasion 
they  took  with  them  the  boy  Jesus,  who  was  beginning  to  be  of  an 
age  to  assume  the  responsibilities  of  the  Law.  We  can  easily  imagine 
how  powerful  must  have  been  the  influence  upon  His  human  develop- 
ment of  this  break  in  the  still  secluded  life ;  of  this  glimpse  into  the 


32  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

great  outer  world;  of  this  journey  through  a  land  of  which  every 
hill  and  every  village  teemed  with  sacred  memories ;  of  this  first  visit 
to  that  Temple  of  His  Father  which  was  associated  with  so  many 
mighty  events  in  the  story  of  the  kings  His  ancestors  and  the  pro- 
phets his  forerunnera. 

Nazareth  lies  from  Jerusalem  at  a  distance  of  about  eighty  miles, 
and,  in  spite  of  the  intense  and  jealous  hostility  of  the  Samaritans, 
it  is  probable  that  the  vast  caravan  of  Galilaean  pilgrims  on  their  way 
to  the  feast  would  go  by  the  most  direct  and  least  dangerous  route, 
which  lay  through  the  old  tribal  territories  of  Manasseh  and  Ephraim. 
Leaving  the  garland  of  hills  which  encircle  the  little  town  in  a  manner 
compared  by  St.  Jerome  to  the  petals  of  an  opening  rose,  they  would 
descend  the  narrow  flower-bordered  limestone  path  into  the  great  plain 
of  Jezreel.  As  the  Passover  falls  at  the  end  of  April  and  the  begin- 
ning of  May,  the  country  would  be  wearing  its  brightest,  greenest, 
loveliest  aspect,  and  the  edges  of  the  vast  corn-fields  on  either  side  of 
the  road  through  the  vast  plain  would  be  woven,  like  the  High  Priest's 
robe,  with  the  blue  and  purple  and  scarlet  of  innumerable  flowers. 
Over  the  streams  of  that  ancient  river,  the  river  Kishon  —  past 
Shunem,  recalling  memories  of  Elisha  as  it  lay  nestling  on  the 
southern  slopes  of  Little  Hermon — past  royal  Jezreel,  with  the  sculp- 
tured sarcophagi  that  alone  bore  witness  to  its  departed  splendour — 
past  the  picturesque  outline  of  bare  and  dewless  Gilboa — past  sandy 
Taanach,  with  its  memories  of  Sisera  and  Barak — past  Megiddo,  where 
He  might  first  have  seen  the  helmets  and  broadswords  and  eagles 
of  the  Iloman  legionary — the  road  would  lie  to  En-Gannim,  where, 
beside  the  fountains,  and  amid  the  shady  and  lovely  gardens  which 
still  mark  the  spot,  they  would  probably  have  halted  for  their  first 
night's  rest.  Next  day  they  would  begin  to  ascend  the  mountains 
of  Manasseh,  and  crossing  the  "  Drowning  Meadow,"  as  it  is  now 
called,  and  winding  through  the  rich  fig-yards  and  olive-groves  that 
fill  the  valleys  round  El  Jib,  they  would  leave  upon  the  right  the  hills 
which,  in  their  glorious  beauty,  formed  the  "  crown  of  pride "  of 
which  Samaria  boasted,  but  which,  as  the  prophet  foretold,  should  be 
as  a  "fading  flower."  Their  second  encampment  would  probably  be 
near  Jacob's  well,  in  the  beautiful  and  fertile  valley  between  Ebal 
and  Gcrizim,  and  not  far  from  the  ancient  Shechem.  A  third  day's 
journey  would  take  them  past  Shiloh  and  Gibeah  of  Saul  and  Bethel 
to  Beeroth  ;  and  from  the  pleasant  springs  by  which  they  would  there 
encamp  a  short  and  easy  stage  would  bring  them  in  sight  of  the 
towers  of  Jerusalem.  The  profane  plumage  of  the  eagle-wings  of 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  88 

Rome  was  already  overshadowing  the  Holy  City ;  but,  towering  above 
its  walls  still  glittered  the  great  Temple,  with  its  gilded  roofs  and 
marble  colonnades,  and  it  was  still  the  Jerusalem  of  which  royal 
David  sang,  and  for  which  the  exiles  by  the  waters  of  Babylon  had 
yearned  with  such  deep  emotion,  when  they  took  their  harps  from  the 
willows  to  wail  the  remorseful  dirge  that  they  would  remember  her 
until  their  right  hands  forgot  their  cunning.  Who  shall  fathom  the 
unspeakable  emotion  with  which  the  boy  Jesus  gazed  on  that  memor- 
able and  never-to-be-forgotten  scene  ? 

The  numbers  who  flocked  to  the  Passover  from  every  region  of 
the  East  might  be  counted  by  tens  of  thousands.  There  were  far 
more  than  the  city  could  by  any  possibility  accommodate ;  and  then, 
as  now  at  Easter-time,  vast  numbers  of  the  pilgrims  reared  for  them- 
selves the  little  succoth — booths  of  mat,  and  wicker-work,  and  inter- 
woven leaves,  which  provided  them  with  a  sufficient  shelter  for  all 
their  wants.  The  feast  lasted  for  a  week — a  week,  probably  of  deep 
happiness  and  strong  religious  emotion ;  and  then,  with  their  mules, 
and  horses,  and  asses,  and  camels,  the  vast  caravan  would  clear  away 
their  temporary  dwelling-places,  and  start  on  the  homeward  journey. 
The  road  was  enlivened  by  mirth  and  music.  They  often  beguiled 
the  tedium  of  travel  with  the  sound  of  drums  and  timbrels,  and 
paused  to  refresh  themselves  with  dates,  or  melons,  or  cucumbers, 
and  water  drawn  in  skins  and  waterpots  from  every  springing  well 
and  running  stream.  The  veiled  women  and  the  stately  old  men  are 
generally  mounted,  while  their  sons  or  brothers,  with  long  sticks  in 
their  hands,  lead  along  by  a  string  their  beasts  of  burden.  The  boys 
and  children  sometimes  walk  and  play  by  the  side  of  their  parents, 
and  sometimes,  when  tired,  get  a  lift  on  horse  or  mule.  I  can  find 
no  trace  of  the  assertion  or  conjecture  that  the  women,  and  boys,  and 
men  formed  three  separate  portions  of  the  caravan,  and  such  is  cer- 
tainly not  the  custom  in  modern  times.  But,  in  any  case,  among  such 
a  sea  of  human  beings,  how  easy  would  it  be  to  lose  one  young  boy ! 

The  apocryphal  legend  says  that  on  the  journey  from  Jerusalem 
the  boy  Jesus  left  the  caravan  and  returned  to  the  Holy  City.  With 
far  greater  truth  and  simplicity  St.  Luke  informs  us  that — absorbed 
in  all  probability  in  the  rush  of  new  and  elevating  emotions — Ho 
"tarried  behind  in  Jerusalem."  A  day  elapsed  before  the  parents 
discovered  their  loss ;  this  they  would  not  do  until  they  arrived  at  the 
place  of  evening  rendezvous,  and  all  day  long  they  would  be  free  from 
all  anxiety,  supposing  that  the  boy  was  with  some  other  group  of 
friends  or  relatives  in  that  long  caravan.  But  when  evening  came, 


34  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

and  their  diligent  inquiries  led  to  no  trace  of  Him,  they  would  learn 
the  bitter  fact  that  He  was  altogether  missing  from  the  band  of 
returning  pilgrims.  The  next  day,  in  alarm  and  anguish — perhaps, 
too,  with  some  sense  of  self-reproach  that  they  had  not  been  more 
faithful  to  their  sacred  charge — they  retraced  their  steps  to  Jerusalem. 
The  country  was  in  a  wild  and  unsettled  state.  The  ethnarch  Arche- 
laus,  after  ten  years  of  a  cruel  and  disgraceful  reign,  had  recently  been 
deposed  by  the  Emperor,  and  banished  to  "Vienne,  in  Gaul.  The 
Romans  had  annexed  the  province  over  which  he  had  ruled,  and  the 
introduction  of  their  system  of  taxation  by  Coponius,  the  first  procu- 
rator, had  kindled  the  revolt  which,  under  Judas  of  Gamala  and  the 
Pharisee  Sadoc,  wrapped  the  whole  country  in  a  storm  of  sword  and 
flame.  This  disturbed  state  of  the  political  horizon  would  not  only 
render  their  journey  more  difficult  when  once  they  had  left  the  shelter 
of  the  caravan,  but  would  also  intensify  their  dread  lest,  among  all  the 
wild  elements  of  warring  nationalities  which  at  such  a  moment  were 
assembled  about  the  walls  of  Jerusalem,  their  Son  should  have  met 
with  harm.  Truly  on  that  day  of  misery  and  dread  must  the  sword 
have  pierced  through  the  virgin  mother's  heart ! 

Neither  on  that  day,  nor  during  the  night,  nor  throughout  a  con- 
siderable part  of  the  third  day,  did  they  discover  Him,  till  at  last  they 
found  Him  in  the  place  which,  strangely  enough,  seems  to  have  been 
the  last  where  they  searched  for  Him — in  the  Temple,  "  sitting  in  the 
midst  of  the  doctors,  both  hearing  them  and  asking  them  questions  ; 
and  all  that  heard  Him  were  astonished  at  His  understanding  and 
answers." 

The  last  expression,  no  less  than  the  entire  context,  and  all  that  we 
know  of  the  character  of  Jesus  and  the  nature  of  the  circumstances, 
shows  that  the  Boy  was  there  to  inquire  and  learn — not,  as  the  Arabic 
Gospel  of  the  Infancy  represents  it,  to  cross-examine  the  doctors  "  each 
in  turn  " — not  to  expound  the  number  of  the  spheres  and  celestial 
bodies,  and  their  natures  and  operations — still  less  to  "  explain  physics 
and  metaphysics,  hypcrphysics  and  hypophysics"  (!)  All  these  are 
but  the  Apollinarian  fictions  of  those  who  preferred  their  heretical  and 
pseudo-reverential  fancies  of  what  was  fitting,  to  the  simple  truth- 
fulness with  which  tho  Evangelist  lets  us  see  that  Jesus,  like  other 
children,  grew  up  in  gradual  knowledge,  consistently  with  the  natural 
course  of  human  development.  He  was  there,  as  St.  Luke  shows  us, 
in  all  humility  and  reverence  to  His  elders,  as  an  eager-hearted  and 
gifted  learner,  whose  enthusiasm  kindled  their  admiration,  and  whoso 
tearing  won  their  esteem  and  love.  All  tinge  of  arrogance  and 


THE    LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  35 

forwardness  was  utterly  alien  to  His  character,  which,  from  His  sweet 
childhood  upward,  was  meek  and  lowly  of  heart.  Among  those 
present  may  have  been — white  with  the  snows  of  well-nigh  a  hundred 
years — the  great  Hillel,  one  of  the  founders  of  the  Masorah,  whom  the 
Jews  almost  reverence  as  a  second  Moses ;  and  his  son,  the  Rabban 
Simeon,  who  thought  so  highly  of  silence ;  and  his  grandson,  the 
refined  and  liberal  Gamaliel ;  and  Shammai,  his  great  rival,  a  teacher 
who  numbered  a  still  vaster  host  of  disciples ;  and  Hanan,  or  Annas, 
son  of  Scth,  His  future  judge  ;  and  Boethus,  the  father-in-law  of 
Herod ;  and  Babha  Ben  Butah,  whose  eyes  Herod  had  put  out ;  and 
Nechaniah  Ben  Hiskanah,  so  celebrated  for  his  victorious  prayers ; 
and  Johanan  Ben  Zacchai,  who  predicted  the  destruction  of  tho 
Temple ;  and  the  wealthy  Joseph  of  Arimathea ;  and  the  timid  but 
earnest  Nicodemus ;  and  the  youthful  Jonathan  Ben  Uzziel,  who 
subsequently  wrote  the  celebrated  Chaldee  paraphrase,  and  was  held 
by  his  contemporaries  in  boundless  honour.  But  though  none  of  these 
might  conjecture  Who  was  before  them — and  though  hardly  one  of 
them  lived  to  believe  on  Him,  and  some  to  oppose  Him  in  years  to 
come — which  of  them  all  would  not  have  been  charmed  and  astonished 
at  a  glorious  and  noble-hearted  boy,  in  all  the  early  beauty  of  his  life, 
who,  though  He  had  never  learned  in  the  schools  of  the  Rabbis,  yet 
showed  so  marvellous  a  wisdom,  and  so  deep  a  knowledge  in  all  things 
Divine  ? 

Here  then — perhaps  in  the  famous  Lishcath  haggazzith,  or  "  Hall  of 
Squares" — perhaps  in  the  Chanujoth,  or  "Halls  of  Purchase,"  or  in 
one  of  the  spacious  chambers  assigned  to  purposes  of  teaching  which 
adjoined  the  Court  of  the  Gentiles — seated,  but  doubtless  at  the  feet  of 
his  teachers,  on  the  many-coloured  mosaic  which  formed  the  floor, 
Joseph  and  Mary  found  the  Divine  Boy.  Filled  with  that  almost 
adoring  spirit  of  reverence  for  the  great  priests  and  religious  teachers 
of  their  day  which  characterised  at  this  period  the  simple  and  pious 
Galilaeans,  they  were  awe-struck  to  find  Him,  calm  and  happy,  in  so 
august  a  presence.  They  might,  indeed,  have  known  that  He  was 
wiser  than  His  teachers,  and  transcendently  more  great ;  but  hitherto 
they  had  only  known  Him  as  the  silent,  sweet,  obedient  child,  and 
perhaps  the  incessant  contact  of  daily  life  had  blunted  the  sense  of 
His  awful  origin.  Yet  it  is  Mary,  not  Joseph,  who  alone  ventures  to 
address  Him  in  the  language  of  tender  reproach.  "My  child,  why 
dost  Thou  treat  us  thus  ?  see,  thy  father  and  I  were  seeking  Thee  with 
aching  hearts."  And  then  follows  His  answer,  so  touching  in  its 
innocent  simplicity,  so  unfathomable  in  its  depth  of  consciousness,  so 

D  2 


36  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

infinitely  memorable  as  furnishing  us  with  the  first  recorded  words  of 
the  Lord  Jesus  : 

"  Why  is  it  that  ye  were  seeking  me  ?  Did  ye  not  know  that  I  must 
l)C  about  my  Father's  business  ?  " 

This  answer,  so  divinely  natural,  so  sublimely  noble,  bears  upon 
itself  the  certain  stamp  of  authenticity.  The  conflict  of  thoughts 
which  it  implies  ;  the  half- vexed  astonishment  which  it' expresses  that 
they  should  so  little  understand  him ;  the  perfect  dignity,  and  yet  the 
perfect  humility  which  it  combines,  lie  wholly  beyond  the  possibility 
of  invention.  It  is  in  accordance,  too,  with  all  His  ministry — in 
.accordance  with  that  utterance  to  the  tempter,  "  Man  shall  not  live 
by  bread  alone,  but  by  every  word  that  proceedeth  out  of  the  mouth 
of  God,"  and  with  that  quiet  answer  to  the  disciples  by  the  well  of 
Samaria,  "  My  meat  is  to  do  the  will  of  Him  that  sent  me,  and  to 
finish  His  work."  Mary  had  said  unto  Him,  "  Thy  father,"  but  in  His 
reply  He  recognises,  and  henceforth  He  knows,  no  father  except  His 
Father  in  heaven.  In  the  "  Did  ye  not  know,"  He  delicately  recalls  to 
them  the  fading  memory  of  all  that  they  did  know ;  and  in  that  "  I 
must,"  He  lays  down  the  sacred  law  of  self-sacrifice  by  which  He  was 
to  walk,  even  unto  the  death  upon  the  cross. 

"  And  they  understood  not  the  saying  which  He  spake  unto  them." 
They — even  they — even  the  old  man  who  had  protected  His  infancy, 
and  the  mother  who  knew  the  awful  secret  of  His  birth — understood 
not,  that  is,  not  in  their  deeper  sense,  the  significance  of  those  quiet 
words.  Strange  and  mournful  commentary  on  the  first  recorded 
utterances  of  the  youthful  Saviour,  spoken  to  those  who  were  nearest 
and  dearest  to  Him  on  earth !  Strange,  but  mournfully  prophetic  of 
all  his  life : — "  He  was  in  the  world,  and  the  world  was  made  by  Him, 
and  the  world  knew  Him  not.  He  came  unto  His  own,  and  His  own 
received  Him  not." 

And  yet,  though  the  consciousness  of  His  Divine  parentage  was 
thus  clearly  present  in  His  mind — though  one  ray  from  the  glory  of 
His  hidden  majesty  had  thus  unmistakably  flashed  forth — in  all  dutiful 
simplicity  and  holy  obedience  "  He  went  down  with  them,  and  came  to 
Nazareth,  and  was  subject  unto  thorn." 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHBIST.  37 

CHAPTER  VII. 

THE    HOME    AT    NAZARETH. 

SUCH,  then,  is  the  "  solitary  floweret  out  of  the  wonderful  enclosed 
garden  of  the  thirty  years,  plucked  precisely  there  where  the  swollen 
bud,  at  a  distinctive  crisis,  bursts  into  flower." 

But  if  of  the  first  twelve  years  of  His  human  life  we  have  only  this 
single  anecdote,  of  the  next  eighteen  years  of  His  life  we  possess  no 
record  whatever  save  such  as  is  implied  in  a  single  word. 

That  word  occurs  in  Mark  vi.  3  :  "  Is  not  this  the  carpenter?" 
We  may  be  indeed  thankful  that  the  word  remains,  for  it  is  full 
of  meaning,  and  has  exercised  a  very  noble  and  blessed  influence  over 
the  fortunes  of  mankind.  It  has  tended  to  console  and  sanctify  the 
estate  of  poverty ;  to  ennoble  the  duty  of  labour ;  to  elevate  the  entire 
conception  of  manhood,  as  of  a  condition  which  in  itself  alone,  and 
apart  from  every  adventitious  circumstance,  has  its  own  grandeur  and 
dignity  in  the  sight  of  God. 

1.  It  shows,  for  instance,  that  not  only  during  the  three  years  of 
His  ministry,  but  throughout  the  whole  of  His  life,  our  Lord  was  poor. 
In  the  cities  the  carpenters  would  be  Greeks,  and  skilled  workmen ; 
the  carpenter  of  a  provincial  village — and,  if  tradition  be  true,  Joseph 
was  "not  very  skilful " — can  only  have  held  a  very  humble  position 
and  secured  a  very  moderate  competence.     In  all  ages  there  has  been 
an  exaggerated  desire  for  wealth  ;  an  exaggerated  admiration  for  those 
who  possess  it ;  an  exaggerated  belief  of  its  influence  in  producing  or 
increasing  the  happiness  of  life  ;  and  from  these  errors  a  flood  of  cares 
and  jealousies  and  meannesses  have  devastated  the  life  of  man.     And 
therefore  Jesus  chose  voluntarily  "  the  low  estate  of  the  poor  " — not, 
indeed,  an  absorbing,  degrading,  grinding  poverty,  which  is  always 
rare,  and  almost  always  remediable,  but  that  commonest  lot  of  honest 
poverty,  which,  though  it  necessitates  self-denial,  can  provide  with 
ease  for  all  the  necessaries  of  a  simple  life.     The  Idumeean  dynasty 
that  had  usurped  the  throne  of  David  might  indulge  in  the  gilded  vices 
of  a  corrupt  Hellenism,  and  display  the  gorgeous  gluttonies  of  a  decay- 
ing civilisation ;  but  He  who  came  to  be  the  Friend  and  the  Saviour, 
no  less  than  the  King  of  All,  sanctioned  the  purer,  better,  simpler 
traditions  and  customs  of  His  nation,  and  chose  the  condition  in  which 
the  vast  majority  of  mankind  have  ever,  and  must  ever  live. 

2.  Again,  there  has  ever  been,  in  the  unenlightened  mind,  a  love  of 
idleness  ;  a  tendency  to  regard  it  as  a  stamp  of  aristocracy ;  a  desire  to 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

delegate  labour  to  the  lower  and  weaker,  and  to  brand  it  with,  the 
stigma  of  inferiority  and  contempt.  But  our  Lord  wished  to  show 
that  labour  is  a  pure  and  a  noble  thing ;  it  is  the  salt  of  life  ;  it  is  the 
girdle  of  manliness ;  it  saves  the  body  from  effeminate  languor,  and 
the  soul  from  polluting  thoughts.  And  therefore  Christ  laboured, 
working  with  His  own  hands,  and  fashioned  ploughs  and  yokes  for 
those  who  needed  them.  The  very  scoff  of  Celsus  against  the  possi- 
bility that  He  should  have  been  a  carpenter  who  came  to  save  the 
world,  shows  how  vastly  the  world  has  gained  from  this  very  circum- 
stance— how  gracious  and  how  fitting  was  the  example  of  such  humility 
in  One  whose  work  it  was  to  regenerate  society,  and  to  make  all 
things  new. 

3.  Once  more,  from  this  long  silence,  from  this  deep  obscurity,  from 
this  monotonous  routine  of  an  unrecorded  and  uneventful  life,   we 
were  meant  to  learn  that  our  real  existence  in  the  sight  of  God  consists 
in  the  inner  and  not  in  the  outer  life.     The  world  hardly  attaches  any 
significance  to  any  life  except  those  of  its  heroes  and  benefactors,  its 
mighty  intellects,  or  its  splendid  conquerors.     But  these  are,  and  must 
ever  be,   the  few.      One   raindrop   of  myriads   falling  on  moor   or 
desert  or  mountain — one  snawflake  out  of  myriads  melting  into  the 
immeasurable  sea — is,  and  must  be,  for  most  men  the  symbol  of  their 
ordinary  lives.     They  die,  and  barely  have  they  died,  when  they  are 
forgotten ;  a  few  years  pass,  and  the  creeping  lichens  eat  away  the 
letters  of  their  names  upon  the  churchyard  stone ;  but  even  if  those 
crumbling  letters  were  still  decipherable,  they  would  recall  no  memory 
to  those  who  stand  upon  their  graves.     Even  common  and  ordinary 
men  are  very  apt  to  think  themselves  of  much  importance  ;  but,  on  the 
contrary,  not  even  the  greatest  man  is  in  any  degree  necessary,  and 
after  a  very  short  space  of  time — 

"  His  place,  in  all  the  pomp  that  fills 
The  circuit  of  the  summer  hills, 
Is  that  his  grave  is  green." 

4.  A  relative  insignificance,  then,  is,  and  must  be,  the  destined  lot 
of  the  immense  majority,  and  many  a  man  might  hence  be  led  to  think, 
that  since  he  fills  so  small  a  space — since,  for  the  vast  masses  of  man- 
kind, he  is  of  as  little  importance  as  the  ephemerid  which  buzzes  out 
its  little  hour  in  the  summer  noon — there  is  nothing  better  than  to 
eat,   and  drink,   and  die.     But   Christ  came  to  convince  us  that  a 
relative  insignificance  may  be  an  absolute  importance.    Ho  came  to 
teach   that  continual    excitement,    prominent    action,    distinguished 
services,  brilliant  success,  are  no  essential  elements  of  true  and  noble- 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  39 

life,  and  that  myriads  of  the  beloved  of  God  are  to  be  found  among 
the  insignificant  and  the  obscure.  "  Si  vis  divinus  esse,  late  ut  Deus," 
is  the  encouraging,  consoling,  ennobling  lesson  of  those  voiceless 
years.  The  calmest  and  most  unknown  lot  is  often  the  happiest,  and 
we  may  safely  infer  that  these  years  in  the  home  and  trade  of  the 
carpenter  of  Nazareth  were  happy  years  in  our  Saviour's  life.  Often, 
even  in  His  later  days,  it  is  clear  that  His  words  are  the  words  of  one 
who  rejoiced  in  spirit ;  they  are  words  which  seem  to  flow  from  the 
full  river  of  an  abounding  happiness.  But  what  must  that  happiness 
have  been  in  those  earlier  days,  before  the  storms  of  righteous  anger 
had  agitated  his  unruffled  soul,  or  His  heart  burned  hot  with  terrible 
indignation  against  the  sins  and  hypocrisies  of  men?  "Heaven,'* 
as  even  a  Confucius  could  tell  us,  "means  principle;"  and  if  at  all 
times  innocence  be  the  only  happiness,  how  great  must  have  been  the 
happiness  of  a  sinless  childhood !  "  Youth,"  says  the  poet-preacher, 
"  danceth  like  a  bubble,  nimble  and  gay,  and  shineth  like  a  dove's 
neck,  or  the  image  of  a  rainbow  which  hath  no  substance,  and  whose 
very  image  and  colours  are  fantastical."  And  if  this  decription  be 
true  of  even  a  careless  youth,  with  what  transcendently  deeper  force 
must  it  apply  to  the  innocent,  the  sinless,  the  perfect  youth  of  Christ  ? 
In  the  case  of  many  myriads,  and  assuredly  not  least  in  the  case  of 
the  saints  of  God,  a  sorrowful  and  stormy  manhood  has  often  been 
preceded  by  a  calm  and  rosy  dawn. 

5.  And  while  they  were  occupied  manually,  we  have  positive 
evidence  that  these  years  were  not  neglected  intellectually.  No  im- 
portance can  be  attached  to  the  clumsy  stories  of  the  Apocryphal 
Gospels,  but  it  is  possible  that  some  religious  and  simple  instruction 
may  have  been  given  to  the  little  Nazarenes  by  the  sopherim,  or  other 
attendants  of  the  synagogue ;  and  here  our  Lord,  who  was  made  like 
unto  us  in  all  things,  may  have  learnt,  as  other  children  learnt,  the 
elements  of  human  learning.  But  it  is,  perhaps,  more  probable  that 
Jesus  received  His  early  teaching  at  home,  and  in  accordance  with 
the  injunctions  of  the  Law  (Deut.  xi.  19),  from  His  father.  He 
would,  at  any  rate,  have  often  heard  in  the  daily  prayers  of  the 
synagogue  all  which  the  elders  of  the  place  could  teach  respecting 
the  Law  and  the  Prophets.  That  He  had  not  been  to  Jerusalem,  for 
purposes  of  instruction,  and  had  not  frequented  any  of  the  schools 
of  the  Rabbis,  is  certain  from  the  indignant  questions  of  jealous 
enemies,  "  From  whence  hath  this  man  these  things  ?  "  "  How 
knoweth  this  man  letters,  having  never  learned  ?  "  There  breathes 
throughout  these  questions  the  Ilabbinic  spirit  of  insolent  contempt 


40  THE   LIFE   OF   CHK1ST. 


for  the  am  ha-aretz  (y^n  or)  or  illiterate  countryman.  The  stereotyped 
intelligence  of  the  nation,  accustomed,  if  I  may  use  the  expression,  to 
that  mummified  form  of  a  dead  religion,  -which  had  been  embalmed  by 
the  Oral  Law,  was  incapable  of  appreciating  the  divine  originality  of 
a  wisdom  learnt  from  God  alone.  They  could  not  get  beyond  the 
sententious  error  of  the  son  of  Sirach,  that  "  the  wisdom  of  the  learned 
man  cometh  by  opportunity  of  leisure."  Had  Jesus  received  the 
slightest  tincture  of  their  technical  training  he  would  have  been  less, 
not  more,  effectually  armed  for  putting  to  shame  the  supercilious 
exclusiveness  of  their  narrow  erudition. 

6.  And  this  testimony  of  His  enemies  furnishes  us  with  a  con- 
vincing and  fortunate  proof  that  His  teaching  was  not,  as  some  would 
insinuate,  a  mere  eclectic  system  borrowed  from  the  various  sects  and 
teachers  of  His  times.  It  is  certain  that  He  was  never  enrolled  among 
the  scholars  of  those  Scribes  who  made  it  their  main  business  to  teach 
the  traditions  of  the  fathers.  Although  schools  in  great  towns  had 
been  founded  eighty  years  before,  by  Simon  Ben  Shatach,  yet  there 
could  have  been  no  Beth  Midrash  or  Beth  Rabban,  no  "  vineyard  "  or 
"array"  at  despised  and  simple  Nazareth.  And  from  whom  could 
Jesus  have  borrowed  ?  —  From  Oriental  Gymnosophists  or  Greek 
Philosophers  ?  No  one,  in  these  days,  ventures  to  advance  so  wild  a 
proposition.  —  From  the  Pharisees  ?  The  very  foundations  of  their 
system,  the  very  idea  of  their  religion,  was  irreconcilably  alien  from 
all  that  He  revealed.  —  From  the  Sadducees  ?  Their  epicurean  insou- 
ciance, their  "  expediency  "  politics,  their  shallow  rationalism,  their 
polished  sloth,  were  even  more  repugnant  to  true  Christianity  than 
they  were  to  sincere  Judaism.  —  From  the  Essenes  ?  They  were  an 
exclusive,  ascetic,  and  isolated  community,  with  whose  discouragement 
of  marriage,  and  withdrawal  from  action,  the  Gospels  have  no  sym- 
pathy, and  to  whom  our  Lord  never  alluded,  unless  it  be  in  those 
passages  where  He  reprobates  those  who  abstain  from  anointing  them- 
selves when  they  fast,  and  who  hide  their  candle  under  a  bushel.  — 
Prom  Philo,  and  the  Alexandrian  Jews  ?  Philo  was  indeed  a  good 
man,  and  a  great  thinker,  and  a  contemporary  of  Christ  ;  but  (even  if 
his  name  had  ever  been  heard  —  which  is  exceedingly  doubtful  —  in  so 
remote  a  region  as  Galilee)  it  would  be  impossible,  among  the  world's 
philosophies,  to  choose  any  system  less  like  the  doctrines  which  Jesns 
taught,  than  the  mystic  theosophy  and  allegorising  extravagance  of 
that  "  sea  of  abstractions  "  which  lies  congealed  in  his  writings.  — 
From  Hillel  and  SJuimmai?  We  know  but  little  of  them;  but 
although,  in  one  or  two  passages  of  the  Gospels,  there  may  be  a  con- 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  41 

ceivable  allusion  to  the  disputes  which  agitated  their  schools,  or  to 
one  or  two  of  the  best  and  truest  maxims  which  originated  in  them, 
snch  allusions,  on  the  one  hand,  involve  no  more  than  belongs  to  the 
common  stock  of  truth  taught  by  the  Spirit  of  God  to  men  in  every 
age ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  the  system  which  Shammai  and  Hillel 
taught  was  that  oral  tradition,  that  dull  dead  Levitical  ritualism,  at 
once  arrogant  and  impotent,  at  once  frivolous  and  unoriginal,  which 
Jesus  both  denounced  and  overthrew.     The  schools  in  which  Jesus  C 
learnt  were  not  the  schools  of  the   Scribes,  but  the  school  of  holy 
obedience,  of  sweet  contentment,  of  unalloyed  simplicity,  of  stainless 
purity,  of  cheerful  toil.     The  lore  in  which  He  studied  was  not  the  f 
lore  of  Rabbinism,  in  which  to  find  one  just  or  noble  thought  we  must 
wade  through  masses  of  puerile  fancy  and  cabalistic  folly,  but  the"^ 
Books  of  God  without  Him,  in  Scripture,  in  Nature,  and  in  Life ;  and 
the  Book  of  God  within  Him,  written  on  the  fleshly  tables  of  the  / 
heart. 

The  education  of  a  Jewish  boy  of  the  humbler  classes  was  almost 
solely  scriptural  and  moral,  and  his  parents  were,  as  a  rule,  his  sole 
teachers.  We  can  hardly  doubt  that  the  child  Jesus  was  taught  by 
Joseph  and  Mary  to  read  the  Shema  (Deut.  vi.  4),  and  the  Hallel 
(Ps.  cxiv. — cxviii.),  and  the  simpler  parts  of  those  holy  books,  on 
whose  pages  His  divine  wisdom  was  hereafter  to  pour  such  floods  of 
light. 

But  He  had  evidently  received  a  further  culture  than  this. 
(i.)  The  art  of  writing  is  by  no  means  commonly  known,  even  in 
these  days,  in  the  East ;  but  more  than  one  allusion  to  the  form  of  the 
Hebrew  letters,  no  less  than  the  stooping  to  write  with  His  finger  on 
the  ground,  show  that  our  Lord  could  write,  (ii.)  That  His  know- 
ledge of  the  sacred  writings  was  deep  and  extensive — that,  in  fact, 
He  must  almost  have  known  them  by  heart — is  clear,  not  only  from 
His  direct  quotations,  but  also  from  the  numerous  allusions  which  He 
made  to  the  Law  and  to  the  Hagiographa,  as  well  as  to  Isaiah, 
Jeremiah,  Daniel,  Joel,  Hosea,  Micah,  Zechariah,  Malachi,  and,  above 
all,  to  the  Book  of  Psalms.  It  is  probable,  though  not  certain,  that 
He  was  acquainted  with  the  uncanonical  Jewish  books.  This  profound 
and  ready  knowledge  of  the  Scriptures  gave  more  point  to  the  half- 
indignant  question,  so  often  repeated,  "Have  ye  not  read?1'  (iii-)  The 
language  which  our  Lord  commonly  spoke  was  Aramaic ;  and  at  that 
period  Hebrew  was  completely  a  dead  language,  known  only  to  the 
more  educated,  and  only  to  be  acquired  by  labour :  yet  it  is  clear  that 
Jesus  was  acquainted  with  it,  for  some  of  His  scriptural  quotations 


42  THE    LIFE   OF   CHEIST. 

directly  refer  to  the  Hebrew  original.  Greek  too  He  must  have 
known,  for  it  was  currently  spoken  in  towns  so  near  His  home  as 
Sepphoris,  Caesarea,  and  Tiberias.  Meleager,  the  poet  of  the  Greek 
anthology,  in  his  epitaph  on  himself,  assumes  that  his  Greek  will  be 
intelligible  to  Syrians  and  Phoenicians:  he  also  speaks  of  his  native 
Gadara,  which  was  at  no  great  distance  from  Nazareth,  as  though  it 
were  a  sort  of  Syrian  Athens.  Ever  since  the  days  of  Alexander  the 
Great,  alike  in  the  contact  of  the  Jews  with  Ptolemies  and  with 
Seleucids,  Hellenic  influences  had  been  at  work  in  Palestine.  Greek 
was,  indeed,  the  common  medium  of  intercourse,  and  without  it  Jesus 
could  have  had  no  conversation  with  strangers — with  the  centurion, 
for  instance,  whose  servant  He  healed,  or  with  Pilate,  or  with  the 
Greeks  who  desired  an  interview  with  Him  in  the  last  week  of  His 
life.  Some,  too,  of  His  scriptural  quotations,  if  we  can  venture  to 
assume  a  reproduction  of  the  ipsissima  verba,  are  taken  directly  from 
the  Greek  version  of  the  Septuagint,  even  where  it  differs  from  the 
Hebrew  original.  Whether  He  was  acquainted  with  Latin  is  much 
more  doubtf  ul,  though  not  impossible.  The  Romans  in  Judeea  must  by 
this  time  have  been  very  numerous,  and  Latin  was  inscribed  upon  the 
coma  in  ordinary  use.  But  to  whatever  extent  He  may  have  known 
these  languages,  it  is  clear  that  they  exercised  little  or  no  influence  on 
His  human  development,  nor  is  there  in  all  His  teaching  a  single 
indisputable  allusion  to  the  literature,  philosophy,  or  history  of  Greece 
or  Rome.  And  that  Jesus  habitually  thought  in  that  Syriac  which  was 
His  native  tongue  may  be  conjectured,  without  improbability,  from 
some  curious  plays  on  words  which  are  lost  in  the  Greek  of  the 
Gospels,  but  which  would  have  given  greater  point  and  beauty  to 
some  of  His  utterances,  as  spoken  in  their  original  tongue. 

7.  But  whatever  the  boy  Jesus  may  have  learned  as  child  or  boy 
in  the  house  of  His  mother,  or  in  the  school  of  the  synagogue,  we 
know  that  His  best  teaching  was  derived  from  immediate  insight  into 
His  Father's  will.  In  the  depths  of  His  inmost  consciousness  did  that 
voice  of  God,  which  spake  to  the  father  of  our  race  as  he  walked  in 
the  cool  evening  under  the  palris  of  Paradise,  commune — more  plainly, 
by  far — with  Him.  He  heard  it  in  every  sound  of  nature,  in  every 
occupation  of  life,  in  every  interspace  of  solitary  thought.  His  human 
life  was  "  an  cphod  on  which  was  inscribed  the  one  word  God." 
Written  on  His  inmost  spirit,  written  on  His  most  trivial  experiences, 
written  in  sunbeams,  written  in  the  light  of  stars,  He  read  everywhere 
His  Father's  name.  The  calm,  untroubled  seclusion  of  the  happy 
valley,  with  its  green  fields  and  glorious  scenery,  was  eminently  con- 


THE   LIFE   OF  'CUBIST.  43 

ducive  to  a  life  of  spiritual  communion ;  and  we  know  how  from  its 
every  incident — the  games  of  its  innocent  children,  the  buying  and 
selling  in  its  little  market-place,  the  springing  of  its  perennial 
fountain,  the  glory  of  its  mountain  lilies  in  their  transitory 
loveliness,  the  hoarse  cry  in  their  wind-rocked  nest  of  the  raven's 
callow  brood — he  drew  food  for  moral  illustration  and  spiritual 
thought. 

Nor  must  we  lose  sight  of  the  fact  that  it  was  in  these  silent, 
unrecorded  years  that  a  great  part  of  His  work  was  done.  He  was 
not  only  "  girding  His  sword  upon  His  thigh,"  but  also  wielding  it 
in  that  warfare  which  has  no  discharge.  That  noiseless  battle,  in 
which  no  clash  of  weapons  sounds,  but  in  which  the  combatants 
against  us  are  none  the  less  terrible  because  they  are  not  seen,  went 
on  through  all  the  years  of  Hia  redeeming  obedience.  In  these  years 
He  "  began  to  do  "  long  before  He  "  began  to  teach."  They  were  the 
years  of  a  sinless  childhood,  a  sinless  boyhood,  a  sinless  youth,  a  sinless 
manhood,  spent  in  that  humility,  toil,  obscurity,  submission,  content- 
ment, prayer,  to  make  them  an  eternal  example  to  all  our  race.  We 
cannot  imitate  Him  in  the  occupations  of  His  ministry,  nor  can  wo 
even  remotely  reproduce  in  our  own  experience  the  external  circum- 
stances of  His  life  during  those  three  crowning  years.  But  the  vast 
majority  of  us  are  placed,  by  God's  own  appointment,  amid  those  quiet 
duties  of  a  commonplace  and  uneventful  routine  which  are  most 
closely  analogous  to  the  thirty  years  of  His  retirement ;  it  was  during 
these  years  that  His  life  is  for  us  the  main  example  of  how  we  ought 
to  live.  "Take  notice  here,"  says  the  saintly  Bonaven£ujra,«^ that 
His  doing  nothing  wonderful  was  in  itself  a  kind  of  wonder.  For 
His  whole  life  is  a  mystery;  and  as  there  was  power  in  His 
actions,  so  was  there  power  in  His  silence,  in  His  inactivity,  and  in 
His  retirement.  This  sovereign  Master,  who  was  to  teach  all  virtues, 
and  to  point  out  the  way  of  life,  began,  from  His  youth  up,  by  sancti- 
fying in  His  own  person  the  practice  of  the  virtuous  life  He  came  to 
teach,  but  in  a  wondrous,  unfathomable,  and,  till  then,  unheard-of 
manner." 

His  mere  presence  in  that  home  of  His  childhood  must  have  made 
it  a  happy  one.  The  hour  of  strife,  the  hour  of  the  sword,  the  hour 
when  many  in  Israel  should  rise  or  fall  Tjecause  of  Him,  the  hour  when 
the  thoughts  of  many  hearts  should  be  revealed,  the  hour  when  the 
kingdom  of  heaven  should  suffer  violence,  and  the  violent  take  it  by 
force,  was  not  yet  come.  In  any  family  circle  the  gentle  influence  of 
one  loving  soul  is  sufficient  to  breathe  around  it  an  unspeakable  calm  j 


44  TH3   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

it  has  a  soothing  power  like  the  shining  of  the  sunlight,  or  the  voice 
of  doves  heard  at  evening ; — 

"  It  droppeth  like  the  gentle  dew  from  heaven, 
Upon  the  place  beneath." 

Nothing  vulgar,  nothing  tyrannous,  nothing  restless  can  permanently 
resist  its  beneficent  sorcery;  no  jangling  discord  can  long  break  in 
upon  its  harmonising  spell.  But  the  home  of  Jesus  was  no  ordinary 
home.  With  Joseph  to  guide  and  support,  with  Mary  to  hallow  and 
sweeten  it,  with  the  youthful  Jesus  to  illuminate  it  with  the  very  light 
of  heaven,  we  may  well  believe  that  it  was  a  home  of  trustful  piety,  of 
angelic  purity,  of  almost  perfect  peace ;  a  home  for  the  sake  of  which 
all  the  earth  would  be  dearer  and  more  awful  to  the  watchers  and 
holy  ones,  and  where,  if  the  fancy  be  permitted  us,  they  would  love  to 
stay  their  waving  wings.  The  legends  of  early  Christianity  tell  us 
that  night  and  day,  where  Jesus  moved  and  Jesus  slept,  the  cloud  of 
light  shone  round  about  Him.  And  so  it  was ;  but  that  light  was  no 
visible  Shechinah ;  it  was  the  beauty  of  holiness ;  it  was  the  peace  of 
God. 

8.  In  the  eleventh  chapter  of  the  Apocryphal  History  of  Joseph 
the  Carpenter,  it  is  stated  that  Joseph  had  four  elder  sons  and  several 
daughters  by  a  previous  marriage,  and  that  the  elder  sons,  Justus  and 
Simon,  and  the  daughters  Esther  and  Thamar,  in  due  time  married 
and  went  to  their  houses.  "  But  Judas  and  James  the  Less,  and  the 
Virgin,  my  mother,"  continues  the  speaker,  who  is  supposed  to  be 
Jesus  Himself,  "  remained  in  the  house  of  Joseph.  I  also  continued 
along  with  them,  not  otherwise  than  if  I  had  been  one  of  his  sons.  I 
passed  all  my  time  without  fault.  I  called  Mary  my  mother,  and 
Joseph  father,  and  in  all  they  said  I  was  obedient  to  them,  nor  did  I 
ever  resist  them,  but  submitted  to  them  ....  nor  did  I  provoke 
their  anger  any  day,  nor  return  any  harsh  word  or  answer  to  them  ; 
on  the  contrary,  I  cherished  them  with  immense  love,  as  the  apple  of 
my  eye." 

This  passage,  which  I  quote  for  the  sake  of  the  picture  which  it 
offers  of  the  unity  which  prevailed  in  the  home  at  Nazareth,  reminds 
us  of  the  perplexed  question,  Had  our  Lord  any  actual  uterine  brothers 
and  sisters  ?  and  if  not,  who  were  those  who  in  the  Gospels  are  so 
often  called  "  the  brethren  of  £he  Lord  ?  "  Whole  volumes  have  been 
written  on  this  controversy,  and  I  shall  not  largely  enter  on  it  here. 
The  evidence  is  so  evenly  balanced,  the  difficulties  of  each  opinion  are 
so  clear,  that  to  insist  very  dogmatically  on  any  positive  solution  of 
the  problem  would  bo  uncandid  and  contentious.  Some,  in  accordance 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  45 

certainly  with  the  primd  facie  evidence  of  the  Gospels,  have  accepted 
the  natural  supposition  that,  after  the  miraculous  conception  of  our 
Lord,  Joseph  and  Mary  lived  together  in  the  married  state,  and  that 
James,  and  Joses,  and  Judas,  and  Simon,  with  daughters,  whose  names 
are  not  recorded,  were  subsequently  born  to  them.  According  to  this 
view,  Jesus  would  be  the  eldest,  and  on  the  death  of  Joseph,  which,  if  we 
may  follow  tradition,  took  place  when  He  was  nineteen,  would  assume  the 
natural  headship  and  support  of  the  orphaned  family.  But  according 
to  another  view,  of  which  St.  Jerome  may  be  called  the  inventor,  these 
brethren  of  our  Lord  were  in  reality  His  cousins.  Mary,  it  is  believed, 
had  a  sister  or  half-sister  of  the  same  name,  who  was  married  to 
Alphseus  or  Clophas,  and  these  were  their  children.  Each  person 
can  form  upon  that  evidence  a  decided  conviction  of  his  own,  but 
it  is  too  scanty  to  admit  of  any  positive  conclusion  in  which  we 
may  expect  a  general  acquiescence.  In  any  case,  it  is  clear  that 
our  Lord,  from  His  earliest  infancy,  must  have  been  thrown  into 
close  connection  with  several  kinsmen,  or  brothers,  a  little  older  or 
a  little  younger  than  Himself,  who  were  men  of  marked  indi- 
viduality, of  burning  zeal,  of  a  simplicity  almost  bordering  on 
Essenic  ascetism,  of  overpowering  hostility  to  every  form  of  corrup- 
tion, disorder,  or  impurity,  of  strong  devotion  to  the  Messianic  hopes, 
and  even  to  the  ritual  observances  of  their  country.  "We  know 
that,  though  afterwards  they  became  pillars  of  the  infant  Church,  at 
first  they  did  not  believe  in  our  Lord's  Divinity,  or  at  any  rate  held 
views  which  ran  strongly  counter  to  the  divine  plan  of  His  self- 
manifestation.  Not  among  these,  in  any  case,  did  Jesus  during  His 
lifetime  find  His  most  faithful  followers,  or  His  most  beloved  compa- 
nions. There  seemed  to  be  in  them  a  certain  strong  opinionativeness, 
a  Judaic  obstinacy,  a  lack  of  sympathy,  a  deficiency  in  the  elements  of 
tenderness  and  reverence.  Peter,  affectionate  even  in  his  worst  weak- 
ness, generous  even  in  his  least  controlled  impulse ;  James  the  son  of 
Zebcdee,  calm  and  watchful,  reticent  and  true ;  above  all,  John,  whose 
impetuosity  lay  involved  in  a  soul  of  the  most  heavenly  tenderness,  as 
the  lightning  slumbers  in  the  dewdrop — these  were  more  to  Him  and 
dearer  than  His  brethren  or  kinsmen  according  to  the  flesh.  A 
hard  aggressive  morality  is  less  beautiful  than  an  absorbing  and 
adoring  love. 

9.  Whether  these  little  clouds  of  partial  miscomprehension  tended 
in  any  way  to  overshadow  the  clear  heaven  of  Christ's  youth  in  the 
little  Galilaean  town,  we  cannot  tell.  It  may  be  that  these  brethren 
toiled  with  Him  at  the  same  humble  trade,  lived  with  Him  under  the 


46  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

same  humble  roof.  But,  however  this  may  be,  we  are  sure  that  He 
would  often  be  alone.  Solitude  would  be  to  Him,  more  emphatically 
than  to  any  child  of  man,  "  the  audience-chamber  of  God ;"  He  would 
beyond  all  doubt  seek  for  it  on  the  grey  hill-sides,  under  the  figs  and 
olive-trees,  amid  the  quiet  fields;  during  the  heat  of  noonday,  and 
under  the  stars  of  night.  No  soul  can  preserve  the  bloom  and  delicacy 
of  its  existence  without  lonely  musing  and  silent  prayer :  and  the 
greatness  of  this  necessity  is  in  proportion  to  the  greatness  of  the  soul. 
There  were  many  times  daring  our  Lord's  ministry  when,  even  from 
the  loneliness  of  desert  places,  He  dismissed  His  most  faithful  and  most 
beloved,  that  He  might  be  yet  more  alone. 

10.  It  has  been  implied  that  there  are  but  two  spots  in  Palestine 
where  we  may  feel  an  absolute  moral  certainty  that  the  feet  of  Christ 
have  trod,  namely — the  well-side  at  Shechem,  and  the  turning  of  that 
road  from  Bethany  over  the  Mount  of  Olives  from  which  Jerusalem 
first  bursts  upon  the  view.  But  to  these  I  would  add  at  least  another — 
the  summit  of  the  hill  on  which  Nazareth  is  built.  That  summit  is 
now  unhappily  marked,  not  by  any  Christian  monument,  but  by  the 
wretched,  ruinous,  crumbling  wely  of  some  obscure  Mohammedan 
suint.  Certainly  there  is  no  child  of  ten  years  old  in  Nazareth  now, 
however  dull  and  unimpressionable  he  may  be,  who  has  not  often 
wandered  up  to  it;  and  certainly  there  could  have  been  no  boy  at 
Nazareth  in  olden  days  who  had  not  followed  the  common  instinct  of 
humanity  by  climbing  up  those  thymy  hill  slopes  to  the  lovely  and 
easily  accessible  spot  which  gives  a  view  of  the  world  beyond.  The 
hill  rises  six  hundred  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea.  Four  or  five 
hundred  feet  below  lies  the  happy  valley.  The  view  from  this  spot 
would  in  any  country  be  regarded  as  extraordinarily  rich  and  lovely; 
but  it  receives  a  yet  more  indescribable  charm  from  our  belief  that 
here,  with  His  feet  among  the  mountain  flowers,  and  the  soft  breeze 
lifting  the  hair  from  His  temples,  Jesus  must  often  have  watched  the 
eagles  poised  in  the  cloudless  blue,  and  having  gazed  upwards  as  Ho 
heard  overhead  the  rushing  plumes  of  the  long  line  of  pelicans,  as  they 
winged  their  way  from  the  streams  of  Kishon  to  the  Lake  of  Galilee. 
And  what  a  vision  would  be  outspread  before  Him,  as  He  sat  at  spring- 
time on  the  green  and  thyme-besprinkled  turf  I  To  Him  every  field 
and  fig-tree,  every  palm  and  garden,  every  house  and  synagogue, 
would  have  been  a  familiar  object ;  and  most  fondly  of  all  amongst  the 
square  flat-roofed  houses  would  His  eye  single  out  the  little  dwelling 
place  of  the  village  carpenter.  To  the  north,  just  beneath  them,  lay 
the  narrow  and  fertile  plain  of  Asochis,  from  which  rise  the  wood- 


THE   LIFE   OP   CHRIST.  47 

crowned  hills  of  Naphtali,  and  conspicuous  on  one  of  tham  was  Safed, 
"the  city  set  upon  a  hill ;"  beyond  these,  on  the  far  horizon,  Hermon 
upheaved  into  the  blue  the  huge  splendid  mass  of  his  colossal  shoulder, 
white  with  eternal  snows.  Eastward,  at  a  few  miles'  distance,  rose  the 
green  and  rounded  summit  of  Tabor,  clothed  with  terebinth  and  oak. 
To  the  west  He  would  gaze  through  that  diaphanous  air  on  the  purple 
ridge  of  Carmel,  among  whose  forests  Elijah  had  found  a  home ;  and 
on  Caifa  and  Accho,  and  the  dazzling  line  of  white  sand  which  fringes 
the  waves  of  the  Mediterranean,  dotted  here  and  there  with  the  white 
sails  of  the  "ships  of  Chittim."  Southwards,  broken  only  by  the 
graceful  outlines  of  Little  Hermon  and  Gilboa,  lay  the  entire  plain  of 
Esdraelon,  so  memorable  in  the  history  of  Palestine  and  of  the  world  ; 
across  which  lay  the  southward  path  to  that  city  which  had  ever  been 
the  murderess  of  the  prophets,  and  where  it  may  be  that  even  now,  in 
the  dim  foreshadowing  of  prophetic  vision,  He  foresaw  the  agony  in  the 
garden,  the  mockingsand  scourgings,  the  cross  and  the  crown  of  thorns. 
The  scene  which  lay  there  outspread  before  the  eyes  of  the  youth- 
ful Jesus  was  indeed  a  central  spot  in  the  world  which  He  came  to 
save.  It  was  in  the  heart  of  the  Land  of  Israel,  and  yet — separated 
from  it  only  by  a  narrow  boundary  of  hills  and  streams — Phoenicia, 
Syria,  Arabia,  Babylonia,  and  Egypt  lay  close  at  hand.  The  Isles 
of  the  Gentiles,  and  all  the  glorious  regions  of  Europe,  were  almosb 
visible  over  the  shining  waters  of  that  Western  sea.  The  standards  of 
Rome  were  planted  on  the  plain  before  Him  ;  the  language  of  Greece 
was  spoken  in  the  towns  below.  And  however  peaceful  it  then  might 
look,  green  as  a  pavement  of  emeralds,  rich  with  its  gleams  of  vivid 
sunlight,  and  the  purpling  shadows  which  floated  over  it  from  the 
clouds  of  the  latter  rain,  it  had  been  for  centuries  a  battle-field  of 
nations.  Pharaohs  and  Ptolemies,  Emirs  and  Arsacids,  Judges  and 
Consuls,  had  all  contended  for  the  mastery  of  that  smiling  tract.  It 
had  glittered  with  the  lances  of  the  Amalekites;  it  had  trembled 
under  the  chariot-wheels  of  Sesostris;  it  had  echoed  the  twanging 
bow-strings  of  Sennacherib ;  it  had  been  trodden  by  the  phalanxes 
of  Macedonia ;  it  had  clashed  with  the  broadswords  of  Rome ;  it  was 
destined  hereafter  to  ring  with  the  battle-cry  of  the  Crusaders,  and 
thunder  with  the  artillery  of  England  and  of  France.  In  that  Plain 
of  Jezreel,  Europe  and  Asia,  Judaism  and  Heathenism,  Barbarism  and 
Civilisation,  the  Old  and  the  New  Covenant,  the  history  of  the  past 
and  the  hopes  of  the  present,  seemed  all  to  meet.  No  scene  of  deeper 
significance  for  the  destinies  of  humanity  could  possibly  have  arrested 
the  youthful  Saviour's  gaze. 


48  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

CHAPTER  VIII. 

THE    BAPTISM    OF    JOHN. 

THUS  then  His  boyhood,  and  youth,  and  early  manhood  had  passed 
away  in  humble  submission  and  holy  silence,  and  Jesus  was  now 
thirty  years  old.  That  deep  lesson  for  all  classes  of  men  in  every 
age,  which  was  involved  in  the  long  toil  and  obscurity  of  those  thirty 
years,  had  been  taught  more  powerfully  than  mere  words  could  teach 
it,  and  the  hour  for  His  ministry  and  for  the  great  work  of  His 
redemption  had  now  arrived.  He  was  to  be  the  Saviour  not  only  by 
example,  but  also  by  revelation,  and  by  death. 

And  already  there  had  begun  to  ring  that  Voice  in  the  Wilder- 
ness which  was  stirring  the  inmost  heart  of  the  nation  with  its  cry, 
"Repent  ye,  for  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  is  at  hand." 

It  was  an  age  of  transition,  of  uncertainty,  of  doubt.  In  the 
growth  of  general  corruption,  in  the  wreck  of  sacred  institutions,  in 
those  dense  clouds  which  were  gathering  more  and  more  darkly  on  the 
political  horizon,  it  must  have  seemed  to  many  a  pious  Jew  as  if  the 
fountains  of  the  great  deep  were  again  being  broken  up.  Already  the 
sceptre  had  departed  from  his  race ;  already  its  high-priesthood  was 
contemptuously  tampered  with  by  Idumeean  tetrarchs  or  Roman  pro- 
curators ;  already  the  chief  influence  over  his  degraded  Sanhedrin  was 
in  the  hands  of  supple  Herodians  or  wily  Sadducees.  It  seemed  as  if 
nothing  were  left  for  his  consolation  but  an  increased  fidelity  to  Mosaic 
institutions,  and  a  deepening  intensity  of  Messianic  hopes.  At  an 
epoch  so  troubled,  and  so  restless — when  old  things  were  rapidly 
passing  away,  and  the  new  continued  unrevealed — it  might  almost  seem 
excusable  for  a  Pharisee  to  watch  for  every  opportunity  of  revolution ; 
and  still  more  excusable  for  an  Essene  to  embrace  a  life  of  celibacy, 
and  retire  from  the  society  of  man.  There  was  a  general  expectation 
of  that  "  wrath  to  come,"  which  was  to  be  the  birth-throe  of  the 
coming  kingdom — the  darkness  deepest  before  the  dawn.  The  world 
had  grown  old,  and  the  dotage  of  its  paganism  was  marked  by  hideous 
excesses.  Atheism  in  belief  was  followed,  as  among  nations  it  has 
always  been,  by  degradation  of  morals.  Iniquity  seemed  to  have  run 
its  course  to  the  very  farthest  goal.  Philosophy  had  abrogated  its 
boasted  functions  except  for  the  favoured  few.  Crime  was  univeral, 
and  there  was  no  known  remedy  for  the  horror  and  ruin  which  it  was 
causing  in  a  thousand  hearts.  Remorse  itself  seemed  to  be  exhausted, 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHEIST.  49 

so  that  men  were  "past  feeling."  There  was  a  callosity  of  heart,  a 
petrifying  of  the  moral  sense,  which  even  those  who  suffered  from  it 
felt  to  be  abnormal  and  portentous.  Even  the  heathen  world  felt  that 
"  the  fulness  of  the  time  "  had  come. 

At  such  periods  the  impulse  to  an  ascetic  seclusion  becomes  very 
strong.  Solitary  communion  with  Grod  amid  the  wildest  scenes  of 
nature  seems  preferable  to  the  harassing  speculations  of  a  dispirited 
society.  Self-dependence,  and  subsistence  upon  -the  very  scantiest 
resources  which  can  supply  the  merest  necessities  of  life,  are  more 
attractive  than  the  fretting  anxieties  and  corroding  misery  of  a  crushed 
and  struggling  poverty.  The  wildness  and  silence  of  indifferent 
Nature  appear  at  such  times  to  offer  a  delightful  refuge  from  tho 
noise,  the  meanness,  and  the  malignity  of  men.  Banus,  the  Pharisee, 
who  retired  into  the  wilderness,  and  lived  much  as  the  hermits  of  tho 
Thebaid  lived  in  after  years,  was  only  one  of  many  who  were  actuated 
by  these  convictions.  Josephns,  who  for  three  years  had  lived  with 
him  in  his  mountain-caves,  describes  his  stern  self -mortifications  and 
hardy  life,  his  clothing  of  woven  leaves,  his  food  of  the  chance  roots 
which  he  could  gather  from  the  soil,  and  his  daily  and  nightly  plunge 
in  the  cold  water,  that  his  body  might  be  clean  and  his  heart  pure. 

But  asceticism  may  spring  from  very  different  motives.  It  may 
result  from  the  arrogance  of  the  cynic  who  wishes  to  stand  apart  from 
all  men ;  or  from  the  disgusted  satiety  of  the  epicurean  who  would 
fain  find  a  refuge  even  from  himself ;  or  from  the  selfish  terror  of  tho 
fanatic,  intent  only  on  his  own  salvation.  Far  different  and  far 
nobler  was  the  hard  simplicity  and  noble  self-denial  of  the  Baptist. 
It  is  by  no  idle  fancy  that  the  mediceval  painters  represent  him 
as  emaciated  by  a  proleptic  asceticism.  The  tendency  to  the  life 
of  a  recluse  had  shown  itself  in  the  youthful  Nazarite  from  hia 
earliest  years ;  but  in  him  it  resulted  from  the  consciousness  of  a 
glorious  mission — it  was  from  the  desire  to  fulfil  a  destiny  inspired 
by  burning  hopes.  St.  John  was  a  dweller  in  the  wilderness,  only  that 
he  might  thereby  become  the  prophet  of  the  Highest.  The  light  which 
was  within  him  should  be  kindled,  if  need  be,  into  a  self-consuming 
flame,  not  for  his  own  glory,  but  that  it  might  illuminate  the  pathway 
of  the  coming  King. 

The  nature  of  St.  John  the  Baptist  was  full  of  impetuosity  and 
fire.  The  long  struggle  which  had  given  him  so  powerful  a  mastery 
over  himself — which  had  made  him  content  with  self-obliteration 
before  the  presence  of  his  Lord — which  had  inspired  him  with 
fearlessness  in  the  face  of  danger,  and  humility  in  tho  midst  of 


50  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

applause — had  left  its  traces  in  the  stern  character,  and  aspect,  and 
teaching  of  the  man.  If  he  had  won  peace  in  the  long  prayer  and 
penitence  of  his  life  in  the  wilderness,  it  was  not  the  spontaneous 
peace  of  a  placid  and  holy  soul.  The  victory  he  had  won  was  still 
encumbered  with  traces  of  the  battle  ;  the  calm  he  had  attained  still 
echoed  with  the  distant  mutter  of  the  storm.  His  very  teaching 
reflected  the  imagery  of  the  wilderness — the  rock,  the  serpent,  the 
barren  tree.  "In  his  manifestation  and  agency,"  it  has  been  said,  "he 
was  like  a  burning  torch ;  his  public  life  was  quite  an  earthquake — the 
whole  man  was  a  sermon ;  he  might  well  call  himself  a  voice — the 
voice  of  one  crying  in  the  wilderness,  Prepare  ye  the  way  of  the 
Lord." 

While  he  was  musing  the  fire  burned,  and  at  the  last  he  spake  with 
his  tongue.  Almost  from  boyhood  he  had  been  a  voluntary  eremite. 
In  solitude  he  had  learnt  things  unspeakable ;  there  the  unseen  world 
had  become  to  him  a  reality ;  there  his  spirit  had  caught  "  a  touch  of 
phantasy  and  flame."  Communing  with  his  own  great  lonely  heart — 
communing  with  the  high  thoughts  of  that  long  line  jof  prophets,  his 
predecessors,  to  a  rebellious  people — communing  with  the  utterances 
that  came  to  him  from  the  voices  of  the  mountain  and  the  sea — he  had 
learnt  a  deeper  lore  than  he  could  have  ever  learnt  at  Hillel's  or 
Shammai's  feet.  In  the  tropic  noonday  of  that  deep  Jordan  valley, 
where  the  air  seems  to  be  full  of  a  subtle  and  quivering  flame — in 
listening  to  the  howl  of  the  wild  beasts  in  the  long  night,  under 
the  lustre  of  stars  "  that  seemed  to  hang  like  balls  of  fire  in  a  purple 
sky  " — in  wandering  by  the  sluggish  cobalt-coloured  waters  of  that 
dead  and  accursed  lake,  until  before  his  eyes,  dazzled  by  the  saline 
efflorescence  of  the  shore  strewn  with  its  wrecks  of  death,  the  ghosts  of 
the  guilty  seemed  to  start  out  of  the  sulphurous  ashes  under  which 
they  were  submerged — he  had  learnt  a  language,  lie  had  received  a 
revelation,  not  vouchsafed  to  ordinary  men — attained,  not  in  the 
schools  of  the  Rabbis,  but  in  the  school  of  solitude,  in  the  school 
of  God. 

Such  teachers  are  suited  for  such  times.  There  was  enough  and 
to  spare  of  those  respectable,  conventional  teachers,  who  spake  smooth 
things  and  prophesied  deceits.  The  ordinary  Scribe  or  Pharisee,  sleek 
with  good  living  and  supercilious  with  general  respect,  might  get  up 
in  the  synagogue,  with  his  broad  phylacteries  and  luxurious  robes, 
and  might,  perhaps,  minister  to  somo  sleepy  edification  with  his 
midrash  of  hair-splitting  puerilities  and  threadbare  precedents ;  but 
the  very  aspect  of  John  the  Baptist  would  have  shown  that  there  was 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

another  style  of  teacher  here.  Even  before  the  first  vibrating  tone  of 
a  voice  that  rang  with  scorn  and  indignation,  the  bronzed  countenance, 
the  nnshorn  locks,  the  close-pressed  lips,  the  leathern  girdle,  the 
mantle  of  camel's  hair,  would  at  once  betoken  that  here  at  last  was  a 
man  who  was  a  man  indeed  in  all  his  natural  grandeur  and  dauntless 
force,  and  who,  like  the  rough  Bedawy  prophet  who  was  his  antitype, 
would  stand  unquailing  before  purple  Ahabs  and  adulterous  Jezebels. 
And  then  his  life  was  known.  It  was  known  that  his  drink  was  water 
of  the  river,  and  that  he  lived  on  locusts  and  wild  honey.  Men  felt  in 
him  that  power  of  mastery  which  is  always  granted  to  perfect  self- 
denial.  He  who  is  superior  to  the  common  ambitions  of  man  ia\ 
superior  also  to  their  common  timidities.  If  he  have  little  to  hope 
from  the  favour  of  his  fellows  he  has  little  to  fear  from  their  dislike ; 
with  nothing  to  gain  from  the  administration  of  servile  flattery,  he  has 
nothing  to  lose  by  the  expression  of  just  rebuke.  He  sits  as  it  were 
above  his  brethren,  on  a  sunlit  eminence  of  peace  and  purity,  unblinded 
by  the  petty  mists  that  dim  their  vision,  untroubled  by  the  petty 
influences  that  disturb  their  life. 

No  wonder  that  such  a  man  at  once  made  himself  felt  as  a  power 
in  the  midst  of  his  people.  It  became  widely  rumoured  that,  in  the 
wilderness  of  Judaea,  lived  one  whose  burning  words  it  was  worth 
while  to  hear ;  one  who  recalled  Isaiah  by  his  expressions,  Elijah  by 
his  life.  A  Tiberius  was  polluting  by  his  infamies  the  throne  of  the 
Empire;  a  Pontius  Pilate,  with  his  insolences,  cruelties,  extortions, 
massacres,  was  maddening  a  fanatic  people;  Herod  Antipas  was 
exhibiting  to  facile  learners  the  example  of  calculated  apostacy  and 
reckless  lust ;  Caiaphas  and  Annas  were  dividing  the  functions  of  a 
priesthood  which  they  disgraced.  Yet  the  talk  of  the  new  Prophet 
was  not  of  political  circumstances  such  as  these :  the  lessons  ho 
had  to  teach  were  deeper  and  more  universal  in  their  moral  and  social 
significance.  Whatever  might  bo  the  class  who  nocked  to  his  stern 
solitude,  his  teaching  was  intensely  practical,  painfully  heart-search- 
ing, fearlessly  downright.  And  so  Pharisee  and  Sadducee,  scribe  and 
soldier,  priest  and  publican,  all  thronged  to  listen  to  his  words.  The 
place  where  he  preached  was  that  wild  range  of  uncultivated  and 
untenanted  wilderness,  which  stretches  southward  from  Jericho  and 
the  fords  of  Jordan  to  the  shores  of  the  Dead  Sea.  The  cliffs  that 
overhung  the  narrow  defile  which  led  from  Jerusalem  to  Jericho  wero 
the  haunt  of  dangerous  robbers ;  the  wild  beasts  and  the  crocodiles 
were  not  yet  extinct  in  the  reed-beds  that  marked  the  swellings  of 
Jordan ;  yet  from  every  quarter  of  the  country — from  priestly  Hebron, 

E  2 


52  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

from  holy  Jerusalem,  from  smiling  Galilee — they  came  streaming 
forth,  to  catch  the  accents  of  this  strange  voice.  And  the  words  of 
that  voice  were  like  a  hammer  to  dash  in  pieces  the  flintiest  heart, 
like  a  flame  to  pierce  into  the  most  hidden  thoughts.  Without  a 
shadow  of  euphemism,  without  an  accent  of  subservience,  without  a 
tremor  of  hesitation,  he  rebuked  the  tax-gatherers  for  their  exfcor- 
tionateness  ;  the  soldiers  for  their  violence,  unfairness,  and  discontent ; 
the  wealthy  Sadducees,  and  stately  Pharisees,  for  a  formalism  and 
falsity  which  made  them  vipers  of  a  viperous  brood.  The  whole 
people  he  warned  that  their  cherished  privileges  were  worse  than 
valueless  if,  without  repentance,  they  regarded  them  as  a  protection 
against  the  wrath  to  come.  They  prided  themselves  upon  their  high 
descent ;  but  God,  as  He  had  created  Adam  out  of  the  earth,  so  even 
out  of  those  flints  upon  the  strand  of  Jordan  was  able  to  raise  up 
/^children  unto  Abraham.  They  listened  with  accusing  consciences  and 
)  stricken  hearts;  and  since  he  had  chosen  baptism  as  his  symbol  of 
V  their  penitence  and  purification,  "  they  were  baptised  of  him  in 
Jordan,  confessing  their  sins."  Even  those  who  did  not  submit  to 
his  baptism  were  yet  "  willing  for  a  season  to  rejoice  in  his  light." 

But  he  had  another  and  stranger  message — a  message  sterner,  yet 
more  hopeful — to  deliver;  for  himself  he  would  claim  no  authority, 
save  as  the  forerunner  of  another ;  for  his  own  baptism  no  value,  save 
as  an  initiation  into  the  kingdom  that  was  at  hand.  When  the  depu- 
tation from  the  Sanhedrin  asked  him  who  he  was — when  all  the 
people  were  musing  in  their  hearts  whether  he  were  the  Christ  or 
no — he  never  for  a  moment  hesitated  to  say  that  he  was  not  the 
Christ,  nor  Elias,  neither  that  prophet.  He  was  "  a  voice  in  the 
wilderness,"  and  nothing  more ;  but  after  him — and  this  was  the 
announcement  that  stirred  most  powerfully  the  hearts  of  men — after 
him  was  coming  One  who  was  preferred  before  him,  for  He  was  before 
him — One  whose  shoe's  latchet  he  was  unworthy  to  unloose — One 
who  should  baptise,  not  with  water,  but  with  the  Holy  Ghost,  ami 
with  fire — One  whose  fan  was  in  His  hand,  and  who  should  thoroughly 
purge  His  floor — who  should  gather  his  wheat  into  the  garner,  but 
burn  up  the  chaff  with  unquenchable  fire.  The  hour  for  the  sudden 
coming  of  their  long-promised,  long-expected  Messiah  was  at  hand. 
His  awful  presence  was  near  them,  was  among  them,  but  they  knew 
Him  not. 

Thus  repentance  and  the  kingdom  of  heaven  were  the  two  cardinal 
points  of  his  preaching,  and  though  he  did  not  claim  the  credentials 
of  a  single  miracle,  yet  while  ho  threatened  detection  to  the  hypocrite 


THE    LIFE    OF    CHRIST.  53 

and  destruction  to  the  hardened,  he  promised  also  pardon  to  tho 
penitent  and  admission  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven  to  the  pure  and 
clean.  "  The  two  great  utterances,"  it  has  been  said,  "  which  he 
brings  from  the  desert,  contain  the  two  capital  revelations  to  which 
all  the  preparation  of  the  Gospel  has  been  tending.  Law  and  pro- 
phecy ;  denunciation  of  sin  and  promise  of  pardon ;  the  flame  which 
consumes  and  the  light  which  consoles — is  not  this  the  whole  of  the 
covenant  ?  " 

To  this  preaching,  to  this  baptism,  in  the  thirtieth  year  of  His 
age,  came  Jesus  from  Galilee.  John  was  his  kinsman  by  birth,  but 
the  circumstances  of  their  life  had  entirely  separated  them.  John,  as 
a  child  in  the  house  of  the  blameless  priest  his  father,  had  lived  at 
Juttah,  in  the  far  south  of  the  tribe  of  Judah,  and  not  far  from 
Hebron  ;  Jesus  had  lived  in  the  deep  seclusion  of  the  carpenter's  shop 
in  the  valley  of  Galilee.  When  He  first  came  to  the  banks  of  the 
Jordan,  the  great  forerunner,  according  to  his  own  emphatic  and 
twice  repeated  testimony,  "  knew  Him  not."  And  yet,  though  Jesus 
was  not  yet  revealed  as  the  Messiah  to  His  great  herald- prophet,  there 
1  was  something  in  His  look,  something  in  the  sinless  beauty  of  His 
ways,  something  in  the  solemn  majesty  of  His  aspect,  which  at  once 
overawed  and  captivated  the  soul  of  John.  To  others  he  was  the 
uncompromising  prophet ;  kings  he  could  confront  with  rebuke ; 
Pharisees  he  could  unmask  with  indignation ;  but  before  this  Pre- 
sence all  his  lofty  bearing  falls.  As  when  some  unknown  dread 
checks  the  flight  of  the  eagle,  and  makes  him  settle  with  hushed 
scream  and  drooping  plumage  on  the  ground,  so  before  "  the  royalty 
of  inward  happiness,"  before  the  purity  of  sinless  life,  the  wild  prophet 
of  the  desert  becomes  like  a  submissive  and  timid  child.  The  battle- 
brunt  which  legionaries  could  not  daunt — the  lofty  manhood  before 
which  hierarchs  trembled  and  princes  grew  pale — resigns  itself, 
submits,  adores  before  a  moral  force  which  is  weak  in  every  external 
attribute  and  armed  only  in  an  invisible  mail.  John  bowed  to  the 
simple  stainless  manhood  before  he  had  been  inspired  to  recognise  the 
Divine  commission.  He  earnestly  tried  to  forbid  the  purpose  of  Jesus. 
He  who  had  received  the  confessions  of  all  others,  now  reverently  and 
humbly  makes  his  own.  "  I  have  need  to  be  baptised  of  Thee,  and 
comest  Thou  to  me  ?  " 

The  answer  contains  the  second  recorded  utterance  of  Jesus,  and 
the  first  word  of  his  public  ministry — "  Suffer  it  to  be  so  now  :  for 
thus  it  becometh  us  to  fulfil  all  righteousness." 

"  I  will  sprinkle  clean  water  upon  you,  and  ye  shall  be  clean  " — 


54  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

such  seems  to  have  been  the  burden  of  John's  message  to  the  sinners 
who  had  become  sincerely  penitent. 

But,  if  so,  why  did  our  Lord  receive  baptism  at  His  servant's 
hands ?,^His  own  words  tell  us ;  it  was  to  fulfil  every  requirement  to 
which  God's  will  might  seem  to  point  (Ps.  xl.  7,  8).  He  did  not 
accept  it  as  subsequent  to  a  confession,  for  He  was  sinless ;  and  in 
this  respect,  even  before  he  recognised  Him  as  the  Christ,  the  Baptist 
clearly  implied  that  the  rite  would  be  in  His  case  exceptional.  But 
He  received  it  as  ratifying  the  mission  of  His  great  forerunner — the 
last  and  greatest  child  of  the  Old  Dispensation,  the  earliest  herald  of 
the  £Tew ;  and  He  also  received  it  as  the  beautiful  symbol  of  moral 
purification,  and  the  humble  inauguration  of  a  ministry  which  came 
not  to  destroy  the  Law,  but  to  fulfil.  His  own  words  obviate  all 
possibility  of  misconception.  He  does  not  say,  "I  must,"  but,  "Thus 
it  becometh  us."  He  does  not  say,  "I  have  need  to  be  baptised;  "  nor 
does  He  say,  "  Thou  hast  no  need  to  be  baptised  of  me,"  but  He  says, 
"  Suffer  it  to  be  so  now."  This  is,  indeed,  but  the  baptism  of  repent- 
ance ;  yet  it  may  serve  to  prefigure  the  "  laver  of  regeneration." 

So  Jesus  descended  into  the  waters  of  Jordan,  and  there  the  awful 
sign  was  given  that  this  was  indeed  "  He  that  should  come."  From 
the  cloven  heaven  streamed  the  Spirit  of  God  in  a  dovelike  radiance 
that  seemed  to  hover  over  His  head  in  lambent  flame,  and  the  Bath 
Kol,  which  to  the  dull  unpurged  ear  was  but  an  inarticulate  thunder, 
spake  in  the  voice  of  God  to  the  ears  of  John — "  This  is  my  beloved 
Son,  in  whom  I  am  well  pleased." 


CHAPTER   IX. 

THE   TEMPTATION. 

His  human  spirit  filled  with  overpowering  emotions,  Jesus  sought  for 
retirement,  to  be  alone  with  God,  and  once  more  to  think  over  His 
mighty  work.  From  the  waters  of  the  Jordan  He  was  led — according 
to  the  more  intense  and  picturesque  expression  of  St.  Mark,  He  was 
"  driven  " — by  the  Spirit  into  the  wilderness. 

A  tradition,  said  to  be  no  older  than  the  time  of  the  Crusades, 
fixes  the  Bceno  of  the  temptation  at  a  mountain  to  the  south  of  Jericho, 


TUE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  55 

which  from  this  circumstance  has  received  the  name  of  Quarantania. 
Naked  and  arid  like  a  mountain  of  malediction,  rising  precipitously 
from  a  scorched  and  desert  plain,  and  looking  over  the  sluggish, 
bituminous  waters  of  the  Sodomitic  sea — thus  offering  a  sharp  contrast 
to  the  smiling  softness  of  the  Mountain  of  Beatitudes  and  the  limpid 
crystal  of  the  Lake  of  Gennesareth — imagination  has  seen  in  it  a  fit 
place  to  be  the  haunt  of  evil  influences — a  place  where,  in  the  language 
of  the  prophets,  the  owls  dwell  and  the  satyrs  dance. 

And  here  Jesus,  according  to  that  graphic  and  pathetic  touch  of 
the  second  Evangelist,  "  was  with  the  wild  beasts."  They  did  not 
harm  him.  "  Thou  shalt  tread  upon  the  lion  and  the  adder :  the  young 
lion  and  the  dragon  shalt  thou  trample  under  feet."  So  had  the  voice 
of  olden  promise  spoken  ;  and  in  Christ,  as  in  so  many  of  His  children, 
the  promise  was  fulfilled.  Those  whose  timid  faith  shrinks  from  all 
semblance  of  the  miraculous,  need  find  nothing  to  alarm  them  here. 
It  is  not  a  natural  thing  that  the  wild  creatures  should  attack  with 
ferocity,  or  fly  in  terror  from,  their  master  man.  A  poet  has  sung  of 
a  tropical  isle  that — 

"  Nor  save  for  pity  was  it  hard  to  take 
The  helpless  life,  BO  wild  that  it  was  tame." 

The  terror  or  the  fury  of  animals,  though  continued  by  hereditary 
instinct,  was  begun  by  cruel  and  wanton  aggression ;  and  historical 
instances  are  not  wanting  in  which  both  have  been  overcome  by  the 
sweetness,  the  majesty,  the  gentleness  of  man.  There  seems  to  be  no 
adequate  reason  for  rejecting  the  unanimous  belief  of  the  early 
centuries  that  the  wild  beasts  of  the  Thebaid  moved  freely  and  harm- 
lessly among  the  saintly  eremites,  and  that  even  the  wildest  living 
creatures  were  tame  and  gentle  to  St.  Francis  of  Assisi.  Who  has  not 
known  people  whose  presence  does  not  scare  the  birds,  and  who  can 
approach,  without  danger,  the  most  savage  dog  ?  We  may  well  believe 
that  the  mere  human  spell  of  a  living  and  sinless  personality  would  go 
far  to  keep  the  Saviour  from  danger.  In  the  catacombs  and  on  other 
ancient  monuments  of  early  Christians,  He  is  sometimes  represented  as 
Orphens  charming  the  animals  with  his  song.  All  that  was  true  and 
beautiful  in  the  old  legends  found  its  fulfilment  in  Him,  and  was  but  a 
symbol  of  His  life  and  work. 

And  he  was  in  the  wilderness  forty  days.  The  number  occurs 
again  and  again  in  Scripture,  and  always  in  connection  with  the  facts 
of  temptation  or  retribution.  It  is  clearly  a  sacred  and  representative 
number,  and  independently  of  other  associations,  it  was  for  forty  days 
that  Moses  had  stayed  on  Sinai,  and  Elijah  in  the  wilderness.  In  moments 


— <--  + 


\   V 


56  THE   LIFE   OF   CUBIST. 

of  intense  excitement  and  overwhelming  thought  the  ordinary  needs  of 
the  body  seem  to  be  modified,  or  even  for  a  time  superseded ;  and  unless 
we  are  to  understand  St.  Luke's  words,  "He  did  eat  nothing,"  as  being 
absolutely  literal,  we  might  suppose  that  Jesus  found  all  that  was 
necessary  for  His  bare  sustenance  in  such  scant  fruits  as  the  desert 
might  afford;  but  however  that  may  be — and  it  is  a  question  of  little 
importance — at  the  end  of  the  time  He  hungered.  And  this  was  the 
tempter's  moment.  The  whole  period  had  been  one  of  moral  and 
spiritual  tension.  During  such  high  hours  of  excitement  men  will 
sustain,  without  succumbing,  an  almost  incredible  amount  of  labour, 
and  soldiers  will  fight  through  a  long  day's  battle  unconscious  or 
oblivious  of  their  wounds.  But  when  the  enthusiasm  is  spent,  when 
the  exaltation  dies  away,  when  the  fire  burns  low,  when  Nature, 
weary  and  overstrained,  reasserts  her  rights — in  a  word,  when  a 
mighty  reaction  has  begun,  which  leaves  the  man  suffering,  spiritless, 
exhausted — then  is  the  hour  of  extreme  danger,  and  that  has  been,  in 
many  a  fatal  instance,  the  moment  in  which  a  man  has  fallen  a  victim 
to  insidious  allurement  or  bold  assault.  It  was  at  such  a  moment  that 
the  great  battle  of  our  Lord  against  the  powers  of  evil  was  fought  and 
won. 

The  struggle  was,  as  is  evident,  no  mere  allegory.  Into  the  exact 
external  nature  of  the  temptation  it  seems  at  once  superfluous  and 
irreverent  to  enter — superfluous,  because  it  is  a  question  in  which  any 
absolute  decision  is  for  us  impossible  ;  irreverent,  because  the  Evange- 
lists could  only  have  heard  it  from  the  lips  of  Jesus,  or  of  those  to 
whom  He  communicated  it,  and  our  Lord  could  only  have  narrated  it 
in  the  form  which  conveys  at  once  the  truest  impression  and  the  most 
instructive  lessons.  Almost  every  different  expositor  has  had  a 
different  view  as  to  the  agency  employed,  and  the  objective  or  sub- 
jective reality  of  the  entire  event.  From  Origen  down  to  Schleier- 
macher  some  have  regarded  it  as  a  vision  or  allegory — the  symbolic 
description  of  a  purely  inward  struggle;  and  even  so  literal  and 
orthodox  a  commentator  as  Calvin  has  embraced  this  view.^On  this 
point,  which  is  a  matter  of  mere  exegesis,  each  must  hold  the  view 
which  seems  to  him  most  in  accordance  with  the  truth ;  but  the  one 
essential  point  ia  that  the  struggle  was  powerful,  personal,  intensely 
real — that  Christ,  for  our  sakes,  met  and  conquered  the  tempter's 
utmost  strength.  ^ 

The  question  as  to  whether  Christ  was  or  was  not  capable  of  sin — 
to  express  it  in  the  language  of  that  scholastic  and  theological  region 
in  which  it  originated,  the  question  as  to  the  peccability  or  impeccability 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  57 

of  His  human  nature — is  one  which  would  never  occur  to  a  simple  and 
reverent  mind.  We  believe  and  know  that  our  blessed  Lord  was  sinless 
— the  Lamb  of  God,  without  blemish  and  without  spot.  What  can  be 
the  possible  edification  or  advantage  in  the  discussion  as  to  whether 
this  sinlessness  sprang  from  a  posse  non  peccare  or  a  non  -posse  peccare  ? 
Some,  in  a  zeal  at  once  intemperate  and  ignorant,  have  claimed  for 
Him  not  only  an  actual  sinlessness,  but  a  nature  to  which  sin  was 
divinely  and  miraculously  impossible.  What  then  ?  If  His  great 
conflict  were  a  mere  deceptive  phantasmagoria,  how  can  the  narrative 
of  it  profit  us  ?  If  ii'G  have  to  fight  the  battle  clad  in  that  armour  of 
human  free-will  which  has  been  hacked  and  riven  about  the  bosom  of 
our  fathers  by  so  many  a  cruel  blow,  what  comfort  is  it  to  us  if  our 
great  Captain  fought  not  only  victoriously,  but  without  real  danger ; 
not  only  uninjured,  but  without  even  a  possibility  of  wound  ?  Where 
is  the  warrior's  courage,  if  he  knows  that  for  him  there  is  but  the 
semblance  of  a  battle  against  the  simulacrum  of  a  foe  ?  Are  we  not 
thus,  under  an  appearance  of  devotion,  robbed  of  One  who,  "  though 
He  were  a  son,  yet  learned  obedience  by  the  things  which  He  suffered  ?  " 
Are  we  not  thus,  under  the  guise  of  orthodoxy,  mocked  in  our  belief 
that  we  have  a  High  Priest  who  can  be  touched  with  a  feeling  of  our 
infirmities,  "  being  tempted  in  all  points  like  as  we  are,  yet  without 
sin  ?  "  They  who  would  thus  honour  Him  rob  us  of  our  living  Christ, 
who  was  veiy  man  no  less  than  very  God,  and  substitute  for  Him  a 
perilous  Apollinarian  phantom  enshrined  "in  the  cold  empyrean  of 
theology,"  and  alike  incapable  of  kindling  devotion  or  of  inspiring 
love. 

Whether,  then,  it  comes  under  the  form  of  a  pseudo-orthodoxy, 
false  and  pharisaical,  and  eager  only  to  detect  or  condemn  the  supposed 
heresy  of  others  ;  or  whether  it  comes  from  the  excess  of  a  dishonouring 
reverence  which  has  degenerated  into  the  spirit  of  fear  and  bondage 
— let  us  beware  of  contradicting  the  express  teaching  of  the  Scriptures, 
and,  as  regards  this  narrative,  the  express  teaching  of  Christ  Himself, 
by  a  supposition  that  He  was  not  liable  to  real  temptation.  Nay, 
Ho  was  liable  to  temptation  all  the  sorer,  because  it  came  like 
agony  to  a  nature  infinitely  strong  yet  infinitely  pure.  In  propor- 
tion as  any  one  has  striven  all  his  life  to  be,  like  his  great  Ensaruple, 
holy,  harmless,  undefiled,  separate  from  sinners,  in  that  proportion 
will  he  realise  the  intensity  of  the  struggle,  the  anguish  of  the 
antipathy  which  pervades  a  nobler  nature  when,  either  by  suggestions 
from  within  or  from  without,  it  has  been  dragged  into  even  apparent 
proximity  to  the  possibilities  of  evil.  There  are  few  passages  in  the 


58  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

Pilgrim's  Progress  more  powerful,  or  more  suggestive  of  profound 
acquaintance  with  the  mysteries  of  the  human  heart,  than  that  in 
which  Christian  in  the  Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Death  finds  his  mind 
filled  with  revolting  images  and  blaspheming  words,  which  have 
indeed  been  but  whispered  into  his  ear,  beyond  his  own  powers  of 
rejection,  by  an  evil  spirit,  but  which,  in  his  dire  bewilderment,  he 
cannot  distinguish  or  disentangle  from  thoughts  which  are  his  own, 
and  to  which  his  will  consents.  In  Christ,  indeed,  we  suppose  that 
such  special  complications  would  be  wholly  impossible,  not  because  of 
any  transcendental  endowments  connected  with  "  immanent  divinity  " 
or  the  "  communication  of  idioms,"  but  because  He  had  lived  without 
yielding  to  wickedness,  whereas  in  men  these  illusions  arise  in  general 
from  their  own  past  sins.  They  are,  in  fact,  nothing  else  but  the 
flitting  spectres  of  iniquities  forgotten  or  unforgotten — the  mists  that 
reek  upward  from  the  stagnant  places  in  the  deepest  caverns  of  hearts 
not  yet  wholly  cleansed.  No,  in  Christ  there  could  not  be  this  terrible 
inability  to  discern  that  which  comes  from  within  us  and  that  which 
is  forced  upon  us  from  without — between  that  which  the  weak  will 
has  entertained,  or  to  which,  in  that  ever-shifting  border-land  which 
separates  thought  from  action,  it  has  half  assented,  and  that  with 
which  it  does  indeed  find  itself  in  immediate  contact,  but  which, 
nevertheless,  it  repudiates  with  every  muscle  and  fibre  of  its  moral 
being.  It  must  be  a  weak  or  a  perverted  intellect  which  imagines 
that  "  man  becomes  acquainted  with  temptation  only  in  proportion  as 
he  is  defiled  by  it,"  or  that  is  unable  to  discriminate  between  the 
severity  of  a  powerful  temptation  and  the  stain  of  a  guilty  thought. 
It  may  sound  like  a  truism,  but  it  is  a  truism  much  needed  alike  for 
our  warning  and  our  comfort,  when  the  poet  who,  better  than  any 
other,  has  traversed  every  winding  in  the  labyrinth  of  the  human 
heart,  has  told  us  with  such  solemnity, 

"'Tis  one  thing  to  be  tempted,  EscalnB, 
Another  thing  to  fall." 

And  Jesus  was  tempted.  The  "  Captain  of  our  salvation "  was 
"  made  perfect  through  sufferings."  "  In  that  He  Himself  hath 
suffered  "being  tempted,  He  is  able  to  succour  them  that  are  tempted." 
The  wilderness  of  Jericho  and  the  Garden  of  Gethsemane — these  wit- 
nessed His  two  most  grievous  struggles,  and  in  these  He  triumphed 
wholly  over  the  worst  and  most  awful  assaults  of  the  enemy  of  souls ; 
but  during  no  part  of  the  days  of  His  flesh  was  He  free  from  tempta- 
tion, since  otherwise  His  life  had  been  no  true  human  life  at  all,  nor 
would  He  in  the  same  measure  have  left  us  an  ensample  that  we  should 


TI1E    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  59 

follow  His  steps.  "  Many  other  were  the  occasions,"  says  St.  Bona- 
ventura,  "on  which  he  endured  temptations."  "They,"  says  St. 
Bernard,  "  who  reckon  only  three  temptations  of  our  Lord,  show  their 
ignorance  of  Scripture."  He  refers  to  John  vii.  1,  and  Heb.  iv.  15 : 
he  might  have  referred  still  more  appositely  to  the  express  statement 
of  St.  Luke,  that  when  the  temptation  in  the  wilderness  was  over,  the 
foiled  tempter  left  Him  indeed,  but  left  Hin  only  "/or  a  season,"  or,  as 
the  words  may  perhaps  be  rendered,  "  till  a  new  opportunity  occurred." 
Yet  we  may  well  believe  that  when  He  rose  victorious  out  of  the  dark 
wiles  in  the  wilderness,  all  subsequent  temptations,  until  the  last, 
floated  as  lightly  over  His  sinless  soul  as  the  cloud- wreath  of  a  summer 
day  floats  over  the  blue  heaven  which  it  cannot  stain. 

1.  The  exhaustion  of  a  long  fast  would  have  acted  more  powerf ally 
on  the  frame  of  Jesus  from  the  circumstance  that  with  Him  it  was  not 
usual.  It  was  with  a  gracious  purpose  that  He  lived,  not  as  a  secluded 
ascetic  in  hard  and  self-inflicted  pangs,  but  as  a  man  with  men.  Nor 
does  He  ever  enjoin  fasting  as  a  positive  obligation,  although  in  two 
passages  He  more  than  sanctions  it  as  a  valuable  aid  (Matt.  vi.  16 — 18; 
ix.  15).  But,  in  general,  we  know  from  His  own  words  that  He  came 
"eating  and  drinking;"  practising,  not  abstinence,  but  temperance  in 
all  things,  joining  in  the  harmless  feasts  and  innocent  assemblages  of 
friends,  so  that  His  enemies  dared  to  say  of  Him,  "Behold  a  gluttonous 
man  and  a  winebibber,"  as  of  John  they  said,  "  He  hath  a  devil."  After 
His  fast,  therefore,  of  forty  days,  however  supported  by  solemn  con- 
templation and  supernatural  aid,  His  hunger  would  be  the  more  severe. 
And  then  it  was  that  the  tempter  came ;  in  what  form — whether  as  a 
spirit  of  darkness  or  as  an  angel  of  light,  whether  under  the  disguise  of 
a  human  aspect  or  an  immaterial  suggestion,  we  do  not  know  and 
cannot  pretend  to  say — content  to  follow  simply  the  Gospel  narrative, 
and  to  adopt  its  expressions,  not  with  dry  dogmatic  assertion  as  to  the 
impossibility  of  such  expressions  being  in  a  greater  or  less  degree 
allegorical,  but  with  a  view  only  to  learn  those  deep  moral  lessons 
which  alone  concern  us,  and  which  alone  are  capable  of  an  indisputable 
interpretation. 

"  If  Thou  be  the  Son  of  God,  command  that  these  stones  be  made 
loaves."  So  spake  the  Tempter  first.  Jesus  was  hungry,  and  "  these 
stones  "  were  perhaps  those  siliceous  accretions,  sometimes  known 
under  the  name  of  lapides  judaici,  which  assume  the  exact  shape  of 
little  loaves  of  bread,  and  which  were  represented  in  legend  as  the 
petrified  fruits  of  the  Cities  of  the  Plain.  The  pangs  of  hunger  work 
all  the  more  powerfully  when  they  are  stimulated  by  the  added  tortures 


60  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

of  a  quick  imagination ;  and  if  the  conjecture  be  correct,  then  the  very 
shape  and  aspect  and  traditional  origin  of  these  stones  would  give  to 
the  temptation  an  added  force. 

There  can  be  no  stronger  proof  of  the  authenticity  and  divine  origin 
of  this  narrative  than  the  profound  subtlety  and  typical  universality  of 
each  temptation.  Not  only  are  they  wholly  unlike  the  far  cruder  and 
simpler  stories  of  the  temptation,  in  all  ages,  of  those  who  have  been 
eminent  saints,  but  there  is  in  them  a  delicacy  of  insight,  an  originality 
of  conception,  that  far  transcend  the  range  of  the  most  powerful 
invention. 

It  was  a  temptation  to  the  senses — an  appeal  to  the  appetites — an 
impulse  given  to  that  lower  nature  which  man  shares  with  all  the 
animal  creation.  But  so  far  from  coming  in  any  coarse  or  undis- 
guisedly  sensuous  form,  it  came  shrouded  in  a  thousand  subtle  veils. 
Israel,  too,  had  been  humbled,  and  suffered  to  hunger  in  the  wilder- 
ness, and  there,  in  his  extreme  need,  God  had  fed  him  with  manna, 
which  was  as  angels'  food  and  bread  from  heaven.  Why  did  not  the 
Son  of  God  thus  provide  Himself  with  a  table  in  the  wilderness  ?  He 
could  do  so  if  He  liked,  and  why  should  He  hesitate  ?  If  an  angel  had 
revealed  to  the  fainting  Hagar  the  fountain  of  Beer-lahai-roi — if  an 
angel  had  touched  the  famishing  Elijah,  and  shown  him  food — why 
should  He  await  even  the  ministry  of  angels  to  whom  such  ministry 
was  needless,  but  whom,  if  He  willed  it,  angels  would  have  been  so 
glad  to  serve  ? 

How  deep  is  the  wisdom  of  the  reply  !  Referring  to  the  very 
lesson  which  the  giving  of  the  manna  had  been  designed  to  teach, 
and  quoting  one  of  the  noblest  utterances  of  Old  Testament  inspira- 
tion, our  Lord  answered,  "  It  standeth  written,  Man  shall  not  live  by 
bread  alone,  but  by  every  word  that  proceedeth  out  of  the  mouth  of 
God."  And  what  a  lesson  lies  herein  for  us — a  lesson  enforced  by  how 
great  an  example — that  we  are  not  to  be  guided  by  the  wants  of  our 
lower  nature ;  that  wo  may  not  misuse  that  lower  nature  for  the 
purposes  of  our  own  sustenance  and  enjoyment ;  that  we  are  not 
our  own,  and  may  not  do  what  we  will  with  that  which  we  imagine 
to  be  our  own  ;  that  even  those  things  which  may  seem  lawful,  are  yet 
not  all  expedient ;  that  man  has  higher  principles  of  life  than  material 
sustenance,  as  he  is  a  higher  existence  than  his  material  frame.  Ho 
who  thinks  that  we  live  by  bread  alone,  will  make  the  securing  of 
bread  the  chief  object  of  his  life — will  determine  to  have  it  at  whatever 
cost — will  be  at  once  miserable  and  rebellious  if  even  for  a  time  be  be 
stinted  or  deprived  of  it,  and,  because  he  seeks  no  diviner  food, 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  61 

will  inevitably  starve  with  hunger  in  the  midst  of  it.  But  he  who 
knows  that  man  doth  not  live  by  bread  alone,  will  not  thus,  for  the 
sake  of  living,  lose  all  that  makes  life  dear — will,  when  he  has  done 
his  duty,  trust  God  to  preserve  with  all  things  needful  the  body  H? 
has  made — will  seek  with  more  earnest  endeavour  the  bread  from 
heaven,  and  that  living  water  whereof  he  who  drinketh  shall  thirst  no 
more. 

And  thus  His  first  temptation  was  analogous  in  form  to  the  last 
ta-unt  addressed  to  Him  on  the  cross — "  If  Thou  be  the  Son  of  God, 
come  down  from  the  cross."  "If" — since  faith  and  trust  are  the 
mainstay  of  all  human  holiness,  the  tempter  is  ever  strongest  in  the 
suggestion  of  such  doubts ;  strong,  too,  in  his  appeal  to  the  free-will 
and  the  self-will  of  man.  "  You  may,  you  can — why  not  do  it  ?  " 
On  the  cross  our  Saviour  answers  not;  here  He  answers  only  to 
express  a  great  eternal  principle.  He  does  not  say,  "  I  am  the  Son 
of  God ; "  in  the  profundity  of  His  humiliation,  in  the  extreme  of  His 
self-sacrifice,  He  made  not  His  equality  with  God  a  thing  to  be  grasped 
at,  "  but  made  Himself  of  no  reputation."  He  foils  the  tempter,  not  as 
very  God,  but  as  very  man. 

2.  The  order  of  the  temptations  is  given  differently  by  St.  Matthew 
and  St.  Luke,  St.  Matthew  placing  second  the  scene  on  the  pinnacle 
of  the  Temple,  and  St.  Luke  the  vision  of  the  kingdoms  of  the  world. 
Both  orders  cannot  be  right,  and  possibly  St.  Luke  may  have  been 
influenced  in  his  arrangement  by  the  thought  that  a  temptation  to 
spiritual  pride  and  the  arbitrary  exercise  of  miraculous  power  was  a 
subtler  and  less  transparent,  and  therefore  more  powerful  one,  than 
the  temptation  to  fall  down  and  recognise  the  power  of  evil.  But  the 
words,  "  Get  thee  behind  me,  Satan,"  recorded  by  both  Evangelists 
(Luke  iv.  8 ;  Matt.  iv.  10) — the  fact  that  St.  Matthew  alone  gives  a 
definite  sequence  ("  then,"  "  again  ") — perhaps,  too,  the  consideration 
that  St.  Matthew,  as  one  of  the  Apostles,  is  more  likely  to  have  heard 
the  narrative  immediately  from  the  lips  of  Christ — give  greater  weight 
to  the  order  which  he  adopts. 

Jesus  had  conquered  and  rejected  the  first  temptation  by  the  ex- 
pression of  an  absolute  trust  in  God.  Adapting  itself,  therefore,  with 
infinite  subtlety  to  the  discovered  mood  of  the  Saviour's  soul,  the  next 
temptation,  challenging  as  it  were  directly,  and  appealing  immediately 
to,  this  absolute  trust,  claims  the  illustration  and  expression  of  it,  not 
to  relieve  an  immediate  necessity,  but  to  avert  an  overwhelming  peril. 
"  Then  he  brought  Him  to  the  Holy  City,  and  setteth  Him  on  the 
pinnacle  of  the  Temple."  Some  well-known  pinnacle  of  that  well- 


62  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

known  mass  must  be  intended ;  perhaps  the  roof  of  the  Stoa  BasiliJce, 
or  Royal  Porch,  on  the  southern  side  of  the  Temple,  which  looked 
down  sheer  into  the  valley  of  the  Kidron  below  it,  from  a  height  so 
dizzy  that,  according  to  the  description  of  Josephus,  if  any  one 
ventured  to  look  down,  his  head  would  swim  at  the  immeasurable 
depth ;  perhaps  Solomon's  Porch,  the  Stoa  Anatolike,  which  Josephus 
also  has  described,  and  from  which,  according  to  tradition,  St.  James, 
the  Lord's  brother,  was  afterwards  precipitated  into  the  court  below. 

"  If  " — again  that  doubt,  as  though  to  awake  a  spirit  of  pride,  in 
the  exercise  of  that  miraculous  display  to  which  He  is  tempted — "if 
thou  be  the  Son  of  God,  cast  Thyself  down."  "  Thou  art  in  danger 
not  self-sought ;  save  Thyself  from  it,  as  Thou  canst  and  mayest,  and 
thereby  prove  Thy  Divine  power  and  nature.  Is  it  not  written  that 
the  angels  shall  bear  Thee  up  ?  "Will  not  this  be  a  splendid  proof  of 
Thy  trust  in  God  ?"  Thus  deep  and  subtle  was  this  temptation ;  and 
thus,  since  Jesus  had  appealed  to  Scripture,  did  the  devil  also  "  quote 
Scripture  for  his  purpose."  For  there  was  nothing  vulgar,  nothing 
selfish,  nothing  sensuous  in  this  temptation.  It  was  an  appeal,  not  to 
natural  appetites,  but  to  perverted  spiritual  instincts.  Does  not  the 
history  of  sects,  and  parties,  and  churches,  and  men  of  high  religious 
claims,  show  us  that  thousands  who  could  not  sink  into  the  slough  of 
sensuality,  have  yet  thrust  themselves  arrogantly  into  needless  perils, 
and  been  dashed  into  headlong  ruin  from  the  pinnacle  of  spiritual  pride  ? 
And  how  calm,  yet  full  of  warning,  was  that  simple  answer,  "It  is 
written  again,  '  Thou  shalt  not  tempt  the  Lord  thy  God.'  "  The  word 
in  the  original  (e'tf7ra/>a<ra<? — Matt.  iv.  7 ;  Deut.  vi.  16)  is  stronger  and 
more  expressive.  It  is,  "  Thou  shalt  not  tempt  to  the  extreme  the  Lord 
thy  God ; "  thou  shalt  not,  as  it  were,  presume  on  all  that  He  can  do 
for  thee ;  thou  shalt  not  claim  His  miraculous  intervention  to  save  thee 
from  thine  own  presumption  and  folly  ;  thou  shalt  not  challenge  His 
power  to  the  proof.  "When  thou  art  in  the  path  of  duty  trust  in  Him 
to  the  utmost  with  a  perfect  confidence;  but  listen  not  to  that 
haughty  seductive  whisper,  "  Ye  shall  be  as  gods,"  and  let  there  be  no 
self-willed  and  capricious  irreverence  in  thy  demand  for  aid.  Then — 
to  add  the  words  so  cunningly  omitted  by  the  tempter — "  shalt  thou 
bo  safe  in  all  thy  ways."  And  Jesus  does  not  even  allude  to  His 
apparent  danger.  Danger  not  self-sought  is  safety.  The  tempter's 
own  words  had  been  a  confession  of  his  own  impotence — "  Cast  Thyself 
down."  Even  from  that  giddy  height  he  had  no  power  to  hurl  Him 
whom  God  kept  safe.  The  Scripture  which  ho  had  quoted  was  true, 
though  he  had  perverted  it.  No  amount  of  temptation  can  ever 


THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  63 

necessitate  a  sin.     With  every  temptation  God  provides  also  "  the  way 

to  escape : 

"  Also  it  is  written, 

'  Tempt  not  the  Lori  thy  God,'  He  said,  and  stood : 
But  Satan,  smitten  by  amazement,  fell." 

3.  Foiled  in  his  appeal  to  natural  hunger,  or  to  the  possibility  of 
spiritual  pride,  the  tempter  appealed  to  "the  last  infirmity  of  noble 
minds,"  and  staked  all  on  one  splendid  cast.  He  makes  up  for  the 
want  of  subtlety  in  the  form  by  the  apparent  magnificence  of  the  issue. 
From  a  high  mountain  he  showed  Jesus  all  the  kingdoms  of  the  world 
and  the  glory  of  them,  and  as  the  Koa-^Ofcpdrwp,  the  "  prince  of  this 
world,"  he  offered  them  all  to  Him  who  had  lived  as  the  village 
carpenter,  in  return  for  one  expression  of  homage,  one  act  of 
acknowledgment. 

"  The  kingdoms  of  the  world,  and  the  glory  of  them ! "  "  There  are 
some  that  will  say,"  says  Bishop  Andrewes,  "  that  we  are  never  tempted 
with  kingdoms.  It  may  be  well,  for  it  needs  not  be,  when  less  will 
serve.  It  was  Christ  only  that  was  thus  tempted;  in  Him  lay  an 
heroical  mind  that  could  not  be  tempted  with  small  matters.  But 
with  us  it  is  nothing  so,  for  we  esteem  more  basely  of  ourselves.  We 
set  our  wares  at  a  very  easy  price ;  he  may  buy  us  even  dagger-cheap. 
He  need  never  carry  us  so  high  as  the  mount.  The  pinnacle  is 
high  enough ;  yea,  the  lowest  steeple  in  all  the  town  would  serve  the 
turn.  Or  let  him  but  carry  us  to  the  leads  and  gutters  of  our  own 
houses ;  nay,  let  us  but  stand  in  our  windows  or  our  doors,  if  he  will 
give  us  so  much  as  wo  can  there  see,  he  will  tempt  us  thoroughly ;  we 

will  accept  it,  and  thank  him  too A  matter  of  half-a-crown,  or 

ten  groats,  a  pair  of  shoes,  or  some  such  trifle,  will  bring  us  on  our 
knees  to  the  devil." 

But  Christ  taught,  "  What  shall  it  profit  a  man,  if  he  gain  the 
whole  world,  and  lose  his  own  soul?" 

There  was  one  living  who,  scarcely  in  a  figure,  might  bo  said  to 
have  the  whole  world.  The  Roman  Emperor  Tiberius  was  at  that 
moment  infinitely  the  most  powerful  of  living  men,  the  absolute, 
undisputed,  deified  ruler  of  all  that  was  fairest  and  richest  in  the 
kingdoms  of  the  earth.  There  was  no  control  to  his  power,  no  limit 
to  his  wealth,  no  restraint  upon  his  pleasures.  And  to  yield  himself 
still  more  unreservedly  to  the  boundless  self-gratification  of  a  volup- 
tuous luxury,  not  long  after  this  time  he  chose  for  himself  a  homo  on 
one  of  the  loveliest  spots  on  the  earth's  surface,  under  the  shadow  of 
the  slumbering  volcano,  upon  an  enchanting  islet  in  one  of  the  most 


Gi  THE   LIFE   OF  CHEIST. 

softly  delicious  climates  of  the  -world.  What  came  of  it  all  ?  He  was, 
as  Pliny  calls  him,  "  tristissimus  lit  constat  hominum,"  confessedly  the 
most  gloomy  of  mankind.  And  there,  from  this  home  of  his  hidden 
infamies,  from  this  island  where  on  a  scale  so  splendid  he  had  tried  tho 
experiment  of  what  happiness  can  be  achieved  by  pressing  the  world's 
most  absolute  authority,  and  the  world's  guiltiest  indulgences,  into  tho 
service  of  an  exclusively  selfish  life,  he  wrote  to  his  servile  and  cor- 
rupted Senate,  "What  to  write  to  you,  Conscript  Fathers,  or  how  to 
write,  or  what  not  to  write,  may  all  the  gods  and  goddesses  destroy  me, 
worse  than  I  feel  that  they  are  daily  destroying  me,  if  I  know."  Rarely 
has  there  been  vouchsafed  to  the  world  a  more  overwhelming  proof  that 
its  richest  gifts  are  but  "  fairy  gold  that  turns  to  dust  and  dross,"  and 
its  most  colossal  edifices  of  personal  splendour  and  greatness  no  more 
durable  barrier  against  the  encroachment  of  bitter  misery  than  are  the 
babe's  sandhcaps  to  stay  the  mighty  march  of  the  Atlantic  tide. 

In  such  perplexity,  in  such  anguish,  does  the  sinful  possession  of 
all  riches  and  all  rule  end.  Such  is  the  invariable  Nemesis  of 
unbridled  lusts.  It  does  not  need  the  snaky  tresses  or  the  shaken 
torch  of  the  fabled  Erinnyes.  The  guilty  conscience  is  its  own 
adequate  avenger;  and  "if  the  world  were  one  entire  and  perfect 
chrysolite,"  and  that  gem  ours,  it  would  not  console  us  for  one  hour 
of  that  inward  torment,  or  compensate  in  any  way  for  those  lacerating 
pangs. 

But  he  who  is  an  inheritor  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven  is  lord  over 
vaster  and  more  real  worlds,  infinitely  happy  because  infinitely  pure. 
And  over  that  kingdom  Satan  has  no  power.  It  is  the  kingdom  of 
God  ;  and  since  from  Satan  not  even  the  smallest  semblance  of  any  of 
his  ruinous  gifts  can  be  gained  except  by  suffering  the  soul  to  do  alle- 
giance to  him,  the  answer  to  alt  his  temptations  is  the  answer  of  Christ, 
"  Get  thee  behind  me  Satan :  for  it  is  written,  '  Thou  shalt  worship  the 
Lord  thy  God,  and  Him  only  shalt  thou  serve.'  " 

Thus  was  Christ  victorious,  through  that  self-renunciation  through 
which  only  can  victory  be  won.  And  the  moments  of  such  honest 
struggle  crowned  with  victory  are  the  very  sweetest  and  happiest 
that  the  life  of  man  can  give.  They  are  full  of  an  elevation  and 
a  delight  which  can  only  be  described  in  language  borrowed  from 
the  imagery  of  Heaven. 

"Then  the  devil  leaveth  Him  "—St.  Luke  adds,  "till  a  fitting 
opportunity  " — "  and,  behold,  angels  came  and  ministered  unto  Him." 


THE   LIFE   OK   CUBIST.  65 

CHAPTER  X. 

THE    FIEST    APOSTLES. 

VICTORIOUS  over  that  concentrated  temptation,  safe  from  the  fiery 
ordeal,  the  Saviour  left  the  wilderness  and  returned  to  the  fords 
of  Jordan. 

The  Synoptical  Gospels,  which  dwell  mainly  on  the  ministry  in 
Galilee,  and  date  its  active  commencement  from  the  imprisonment  of 
John,  omit  all  record  of  the  intermediate  events,  and  only  mention  our 
Lord's  retirement  to  Nazareth.  It  is  to  the  fourth  Evangelist  that  we 
owe  the  beautiful  narrative  of  the  days  which  immediately  ensued  upon 
the  temptation.  The  Judsean  ministry  is  brought  by  him  into  the  first 
prominence.  He  seems  to  have  made  a  point  of  relating  nothing  of 
which  he  had  not  been  a  personal  witness,  and  there  are  some  few 
indications  that  he  was  bound  to  Jerusalem  by  peculiar  relations.  By 
station  St.  John  was  a  fisherman,  and  it  is  not  impossible  that,  as  the 
fish  of  the  Lake  of  Galilee  were  sent  in  large  quantities  to  Jerusalem, 
he  may  have  lived  there  at  certain  seasons  in  connection  with  the 
employment  of  his  father  and  his  brother,  who,  as  the  owners  of  their 
own  boat  and  the  masters  of  hired  servants,  evidently  occupied  a 
position  of  some  importance.  Be  that  as  it  may,  it  is  St.  John  alone 
who  narrates  to  us  the  first  call  of  the  earliest  Apostles,  and  he  relates 
it  with  all  the  minute  particulars  and  graphic  touches  of  one  on  whoso 
heart  and  memory  each  incident  had  been  indelibly  impressed. 

The  deputation  of  the  Sanhedrin  (to  which  we  have  already  alluded) 
seems  to  have  taken  place  the  day  previous  to  our  Lord's  return  from 
the  wilderness  ;  and  when,  on  the  following  morning,  the  Baptist  saw 
Jesus  approaching,  he  delivered  a  public  and  emphatic  testimony  that 
this  was  indeed  the  Messiah  who  had  been  marked  out  to  him  by  the 
appointed  sign,  and  that  He  was  "  the  Lamb  of  God  that  taketh  away 
the  sin  of  the  world."  Whether  the  prominent  conception  in  the 
Baptist's  mind  was  the  Paschal  Lamb,  or  the  Lamb  of  the  morning 
and  evening  sacrifice ;  whether  "  the  world  "  (#007x0?)  was  the  actual 
expression  which  he  used,  or  is  merely  a  Greek  rendering  of  the  word 
"  people  "  (cv)  ;  whether  he  understood  the  profound  and  awful  import 
of  his  own  utterance,  or  was  carried  by  prophetic  inspiration  beyond 
himself — we  cannot  tell.  But  this  much  is  clear,  that  since  his  whole 
imagery,  and  indeed  the  very  description  of  his  own  function  and 
position,  is,  as  we  have  already  seen,  borrowed  from  the  Evangelical 

r 


66  THE   LIFE   OF  CHKIST. 

prophet,  lie  must  have  used  the  expression  with  distinct  reference  to 
the  picture  of  Divine  patience  and  mediatorial  suffering  in  Isa.  liii.  7 
(cf.  Jer.  xi.  19).  His  words  could  hardly  have  involved  less  meaning 
than  this — that  the  gentle  and  sinless  man  to  whom  he  pointed  should 
be  a  man  of  sorrows,  and  that  these  sorrows  should  be  for  the  salva- 
tion of  His  race.  "Whatever  else  the  words  may  have  connoted  to  tho 
minds  of  his  hearers,  yet  they  could  hardly  have  thought  them  over 
without  connecting  Jesus  with  the  conceptions  of  sinlessness,  of  suffer- 
ing, and  of  a  redeeming  work. 

Memorable  as  this  testimony  was,  it  seems  on  the  first  day  to  have 
produced  no  immediate  result.  But  on  the  second  day,  when  the 
Baptist  was  standing  accompanied  by  two  of  his  disciples,  Jesus  again 
walked  by,  and  John,  fixing  upon  Him  his  intense  and  earnest  gaze, 
exclaimed  again,  as  though  with  involuntary  awe  and  admiration, 
"  Behold  the  Lamb  of  God !  " 

The  words  were  too  remarkable  to  be  again  neglected,  and  the  two 
Galilaaan  youths  who  heard  them  followed  the  retreating  figure  of 
Jesus.  He  caught  the  sound  of  their  timid  footsteps,  and  turning 
round  to  look  at  them  as  they  come  near,  He  gently  asked,  "  What 
seek  ye  ?  " 

It  was  but  the  very  beginning  of  His  ministry :  as  yet  they  could 
not  know  Him  for  all  that  He  was ;  as  yet  they  had  not  heard  the 
gracious  words  that  proceeded  out  of  His  lips  ;  in  coming  to  seek  Him 
thus  they  might  be  actuated  by  inadequate  motives,  or  even  by  mere 
passing  curiosity ;  it  was  fit  that  they  should  come  to  Him  by  spon- 
taneous impulse,  and  declare  their  object  of  their  own  free  will. 

But  how  deep  and  full  of  meaning  is  that  question,  and  how  sternly 
it  behoves  all  who  come  to  their  Lord  to  answer  it !  One  of  the 
holiest  of  the  church's  saints,  Sb.  Bernard,  was  in  tho  habit  of  con- 
stantly warning  himself  by  the  solemn  query,  "  Bernardo,  ad  quid 
venisti?" — "Bernard,  for  what  purpose  art  thou  here?"  Self- 
examination  could  assume  no  more  searching  form  ;  but  all  the  mean- 
ing which  it  involved  was  concentrated  in  that  quiet  and  simple 
question,  "  What  seek  ye  ?  " 

It  was  more  than  the  two  young  Galileeans  could  answer  Him  at 
once ;  it  meant  more  perhaps  than  they  knew  or  understood,  yet  the 
answer  showed  that  they  were  in  earnest.  "  Rabbi,"  they  said  (and 
the  title  of  profound  honour  and  reverence  showed  how  deeply  His 
presence  had  impressed  them),  "where  art  thou  staying  ?" 

Where  it  was  wo  do  not  know.  Perhaps  in  one  of  the  temporary 
tucctth,  or  booths,  covered  at  the  top  with  the  striped  a&&a,  which  is 


THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  07 

in  the  East  an  article  of  ordinary  wear,  and  with  their  wattled  sides 
interwoven  with  green  branches  of  terebinth  or  palm,  which  must  have 
given  the  only  shelter  possible  to  the  hundreds  who  had  nocked  to 
John's  baptism.  "  He  saith  to  them,  Come  and  see."  Again,  the 
words  were  very  simple,  though  they  occur  in  passages  of  much  sig- 
nificance. Never,  however,  did  they  produce  a  result  more  remarkable 
than  now.  They  came  and  saw  where  Jesus  dwelt,  and  as  it  was  then 
four  in  the  afternoon,  stayed  there  that  day,  and  probably  slept  there 
that  night ;  and  before  they  lay  down  to  sleep  they  knew  and  felt  in 
their  inmost  hearts  that  the  kingdom  of  heaven  had  come,  that  the 
hopes  of  long  centuries  were  now  fulfilled,  that  they  had  been  in  the 
presence  of  Him  who  was  the  desire  of  all  nations,  the  Priest  greater 
than  Aaron,  the  Prophet  greater  than  Moses,  the  King  greater  than 
David,  the  true  Star  of  Jacob  and  Sceptre  of  Israel. 

One  of  those  two  youths  who  thus  came  earliest  to  Christ  was 
Andrew.  The  other  suppressed  his  own  name  because  he  was  the 
narrator,  the  beloved  disciple,  the  Evangelist  St.  John.  No  wonder 
that  the  smallest  details,  down  even  to  the  very  hour  of  the  day,  were 
treasured  in  his  memory,  never  to  be  forgotten,  even  in  extreme 
old  age. 

It  was  the  first  care  of  Andrew  to  find  his  brother  Simon,  and 
tell  him  of  this  great  Eureka.  He  brought  him  to  Jesus,  and  Jesus 
looking  earnestly  on  him  with  that  royal  gaze  which  read  intuitively 
the  inmost  thoughts — seeing  at  a  glance  in  that  simple  fisherman  all 
the  weakness  but  also  all  the  splendid  greatness  of  the  man — said, 
giving  him  a  new  name,  which  was  long  afterwards  yet  more  solemnly 
confirmed,  "  Thou  art  Simon,  the  son  of  Jona ;  thou  shalt  be  called\ 
IKephas ; "  that  is,  "Thou  art  Simon,  the  son  of  the  dove;  hereafter!^ 
thou  shalt  be  as  the  rock  in  which  the  dove  hides."  It  was,  indeed,  a/ 
Iplay  upon  the  word,  but  one  which  was  memorably  symbolic  and  pro- 
found. None  but  the  shallow  and  the  ignorant  will  see,  in  such  a 
play  upon  the  name,  anything  derogatory  to  the  Saviour's  dignity. 
The  essential  meaning  and  augury  of  names  had  been  in  all  ages  a 
belief  among  the  Jews,  whose  very  language  was  regarded  by  them- 
selves as  being  no  less  sacred  than  the !  oracular  gems  on  Aaron's 
breast.  Their  belief  in  the  mystic  potency  of  sounds,  of  the  tongue 
guided  by  unalterable  destiny  in  the  realms  of  seeming  chance,  may 
seem  idle  and  superstitious  to  an  artificial  cultivation,  but  has  been 
shared  by  many  of  the  deepest  thinkers  in  every  age. 

How  was  it  that  these  youths  of  Galilee,  how  was  it  that  a  John 
so  fervid  yet  contemplative,  a  Peter  so  impetuous  in  his  affections,  yet 

r  2 


68  THE   LIFE    OF  CUEIST. 

so  timid  in  his  resolves,  were  thus  brought  at  once — brought,  as  it 
were,  by  a  single  look,  by  a  single  word — to  the  Saviour's  feet  ?  How 
came  they  thus,  by  one  flash  of  insight  or  of  inspiration,  to  recognise, 
in  the  carpenter  of  Nazareth,  the  Messiah  of  prophecy,  the  Son  of 
God,  the  Saviour  of  the  world  ? 

Doubtless  in  part  by  what  He  said,  and  by  what  John  the  Baptist 
had  testified  concerning  Him,  but  doubtless  also  in  part  by  His  very 
look.  On  this  subject,  indeed,  tradition  has  varied  in  a  most  remark- 
able manner;  but  on  a  point  of  so  much  interest  we  may  briefly 
pause. 

Any  one  who  has  studied  the  representations  of  Christ  in  mediaeval 
art  will  have  observed  that  some  of  them,  particularly  in  missals,  are 
degradingly  and  repulsively  hideous,  while  others  are  conceived  in  the 
softest  and  loveliest  ideal  of  human  beauty.  Whence  came  this 
singular  divergence  ? 

It  came  from  the  prophetic  passages  which  were  supposed  to  indi- 
cate the  appearance  of  the  Messiah,  as  well  as  His  life. 

The  early  Church,  accustomed  to  the  exquisite  perfection  of  form 
in  which  the  genius  of  heathen  sculpture  had  clothed  its  conceptions 
of  the  younger  gods  of  Olympus — aware,  too,  of  the  fatal  corruptions 
of  a  sensual  imagination — seemed  to  find  a  pleasure  in  breaking  loose 
from  this  adoration  of  personal  endowments,  and  in  taking  as  their 
ideal  of  the  bodily  aspect  of  our  Lord,  Isaiah's  picture  of  a  patient  and 
afflicted  sufferer,  or  David's  pathetic  description  of  a  smitten  and 
•wasted  outcast.  His  beauty,  says  Clemens  of  Alexandria,  was  in 
His  soul  and  in  His  actions,  but  in  appearance  He  was  base.  Justin 
Martyr  describes  Him  as  being  without  beauty,  without  glory,  without 
honour.  His  body,  says  Origen,  was  small,  and  ill-shapen,  and  ignoble. 
"  His  body,"  says  Tertullian,  "  had  no  human  handsomeness,  much 
Jess  any  celestial  splendour."  The  heathen  Celsus,  as  we  learn  from 
Origen,  even  argued  from  His  traditional  meanness  and  ugliness  of 
aspect  as  a  ground  for  rejecting  His  divine  origin.  Nay,  this  kind  of 
distorted  inference  went  to  even  greater  extremities.  The  Vulgate 
rendering  of  Isa.  liii.  4  is,  "  Nos  putavimus  cum  quasi  leprosum,  per- 
cnssum  a  Deo  et  humiliatum ; "  and  this  gave  rise  to  a  wide-spread 
fancy  of  which  there  are  many  traces,  that  He  who  healed  so  many 
leprosies  was  Himself  a  leper  ! 

Shocked,  on  the  other  hand,  by  these  revolting  fancies,  there  were 
many  who  held  that  Jesus,  in  His  earthly  features,  reflected  the  char:n 
and  beauty  of  David,  His  great  ancestor;  and  St.  Jerome  and  St. 
Augustine  preferred  to  apply  to  Him  the  words  of  Psalm  xlv.  2,  3, 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  69 

"  Thou  art  fairer  than  the  children  of  men."  It  was  natural  that, 
in  the  absence  of  positive  indications,  this  view  should  command  a 
deeper  sympathy  and  it  gave  rise  both  to  the  current  descriptions 
of  Christ,  and  also  to  those  ideals,  so  full  of  mingled  majesty  and 

tenderness  in — 

"  That  face 

How  beautiful,  if  sorrow  had  not  mado 
Sorrow  more  beautiful  than  beauty's  self," 

which  we  see  in  the  great  pictures  of  Fra  Angelico,  of  Michael  Angelo, 
of  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  of  Raphael,  and  of  Titian. 

Independently  of  all  tradition,  we  may  believe  with  reverent  con- 
viction that  there  could  have  been  nothing  mean  or  repugnant — that 
there  must,  as  St.  Jerome  says,  have  been  "  something  starry  " — in  the 
form  which  enshrined  an  Eternal  Divinity  and  an  Infinite  Holiness. 
All  true  beauty  is  but  "  the  sacrament  of  goodness,"  and  a  conscience 
so  stainless,  a  spirit  so  full  of  harmony,  a  life  so  purely  noble,  could  > 
not  but  express  itself  in  the  bearing,  could  not  but  be  reflected  in  the  face,  j 
of  the  Son  of  Man.  We  do  not  indeed  find  any  allusion  to  this  charm 
of  aspect,  as  we  do  in  the  description  of  the  young  High-priest  Aristo- 
bulos  whom  Herod  murdered  ;  but  neither,  on  the  other  hand,  do  we 
find  in  the  language  of  His  enemies  a  single  word  or  allusion  which 
might  have  been  founded  on  an  unworthy  appearance.  He  of  whom 
John  bore  witness  as  the  Christ — He  whom  the  multitude  would  gladly 
have  seized  that  He  might  be  their  king — He  whom  the  city  saluted 
with  triumphant  shouts  as  the  Son  of  David — He  to  whom  women 
ministered  with  such  deep  devotion,  and  whose  aspect,  even  in  the 
troubled  images  of  a  dream,  had  inspired  a  Roman  lady  with  interest 
and  awe — He  whose  mere  word  caused  Philip  and  Matthew  and  many 
others  to  leave  all  and  follow  Him — He  whose  one  glance  broke  into 
an  agony  of  repentance  the  heart  of  Peter — He  before  whose  presence 
those  possessed  with  devils  were  alternately  agitated  into  frenzy  and 
calmed  into  repose,  and  at  whose  question,  in  the  very  crisis  of  His 
weakness  and  betrayal,  His  most  savage  enemies  shrank  and  fell 
prostrate  in  the  moment  of  their  most  infuriated  wrath — such  an 
One  as  this  could  not  have  been  without  the  personal  majesty  of  a 
Prophet  and  a  Priest.  All  the  facts  of  His  life  speak  convincingly  of 
that  strength,  and  endurance,  and  dignity,  and  electric  influence  which 
none  could  have  exercised  without  a  large  share  of  human,  no  less 
than  of  spiritual,  gifts.  "  Certainly,"  says  St.  Jerome,  "  a  flame  of 
fire  and  starry  brightness  flashed  from  His  eye,  and  the  majesty  of  the 
Godhead  shone  in  His  face." 


70  THE   LIFE    OF   CHEIST. 

The  third  day  after  the  return  from  the  wilderness  seems  to  have 
been  spent  by  Jesus  in  intercourse  with  His  new  disciples.  On  the 
fourth  day  He  wished  to  start  for  His  return  to  Galilee,  and  on  the 
journey  fell  in  with  another  young  fisherman,  Philip  of  Bethsaida. 
Alone  of  the  apostles  Philip  had  a  Greek  name,  derived,  perhaps,  from 
the  tetrarch  Philip,  since  the  custom  of  naming  children  after  reigning 
princes  has  always  been  a  common  one.  If  so,  he  must  at  this  time 
have  been  under  thirty.  Possibly  his  Greek  name  indicates  his 
familiarity  with  some  of  the  Greek-speaking  population  who  lived 
mingled  with  the  Galilaeans  on  the  shores  of  Gennesareth;  and  this 
may  account  for  the  fact  that  he,  rather  than  any  of  the  other  Apostles, 
was  appealed  to  by  the  Greeks  who,  in  the  last  week  of  His  life,  wished 
to  see  our  Lord.  One  word — the  one  pregnant  invitation,  "Follow 
me!" — was  sufficient  to  attach  to  Jesus  for  ever  the  gentle  and  simple- 
minded  Apostle,  whom  in  all  probability  he  had  previously  known. 

The  next  day  a  fifth  neophyte  was  added  to  that  sacred  and  happy 
band.  Eager  to  communicate  the  rich  discovery  which  he  had  made, 
Philip  sought  out  his  friend  Nathanael,  exercising  thereby  the  divinest 
;  prerogative  of  friendship,  which  consists  in  the  communication  to 
(others  of  all  that  we  have  ourselves  experienced  to  be  most  divine. 
Nathanael,  in  the  list  of  Apostles,  is  generally,  and  almost  indubitably, 
identified  with  Bartholomew  ;  for  Bartholomew  is  less  a  name  than  a 
designation — "  Bar-Tolmai,  the  son  of  Tolmai;"  and  while  Nathanael 
is  only  in  one  other  place  mentioned  under  this  name  (John  xxi.  2), 
Bartholomew  (of  whom,  on  any  other  supposition,  we  should  know 
nothing  whatever)  is,  in  the  list  of  Apostles,  almost  invariably  associated 
with  Philip.  As  his  home  was  at  Cana  of  Galilee,  the  son  of  Tolmai 
might  easily  have  become  acquainted  with  the  young  fishermen  of 
Geunesareth.  And  yet  so  deep  was  the  retirement  in  which  up  to  this 
time  Jesus  had  lived  Hia  life,  that  though  Nathanael  knew  Philip,  he 
knew  nothing  of  Christ.  The  simple  mind  of  Philip  seemed  to  find  a 
pleasure  in  contrasting  the  grandeur  of  His  office  with  the  meanness  of 
His  birth :  "  We  have  found  Him  of  whom  Moses  in  the  Law,  and  the 
Prophets,  did  write ;  "  whom  think  you  ? — a  young  Herodian  Prince  ? 
— a  young  Asmoneean  priest  ? — some  burning  light  from  the  schools  of 
Shammai  or  Hillel  ? — some  passionate  young  Emir  from  the  followers 
of  Judas  of  Gamala  ? — no,  but  "  Jesiw  of  Nazareth,  the  son  of  Joseph" 

Nathanael  seems  to  have  felt  the  contrast.  He  caught  at  the  local 
designation.  It  may  be,  as  legend  says,  that  he  was  a  man  of  higher 
position  than  the  rest  of  the  Apostles.  It  has  been  usually  considered 
that  his  answer  was  proverbial  j  but  perhaps  it  was  a  passing  allusion 


THE   LIFE   OF  CUBIST. 

to  the  word  nazora,  "despicable;"  or  it  may  merely  have  implied 
"  Nazareth,  that  obscure  and  ill-reputed  town  in  its  little  untrodden 
valley — can  anything  good  come  from  thence  ?  "  The  answer  is  in  the 
same  words  which  our  Lord  had  addressed  to  John  and  Andrew. 
Philip  was  an  apt  scholar,  and  he  too  said,  "  Come  and  see." 

To-day,  too,  that  question — "  Can  any  good  thing  come  out  of 
Nazareth  ?  " — is  often  repeated,  and  the  one  sufficient  answer — almost 
the  only  possible  answer — is  now,  as  it  then  was,  "  Come  and  see." 
Then  it  meant,  come  and  see  One  who  speaks  as  never  man  spake ; 
come  and  see  One  who,  though  he  be  but  the  Carpenter  of  Nazareth, 
yet  overawes  the  souls  of  all  who  approach  Him — seeming  by  His  mere 
presence  to  reveal  the  secrets  of  all  hearts,  yet  drawing  to  Him  even 
the  most  sinful  with  a  sense  of  yearning  love  ;  come  and  see  One  from 
whom  there  seems  to  breathe  forth  the  irresistible  charm  of  a  sinless 
purity,  the  unapproachable  beauty  of  a  Divine  life.  "  Come  and  see," 
said  Philip,  convinced  in  his  simple  faithful  heart  that  to  see  Jesus 
was  to  know  Him,  and  to  know  was  to  love,  and  to  love  was  to  adore. 
In  this  sense,  indeed,  we  can  say  "  come  and  see  "  no  longer ;  for  since 
the  blue  heavens  closed  on  the  visions  which  were  vouchsafed  to  St. 
Stephen  and  St.  Paul,  His  earthly  form  has  been  visible  no  more. 
But  there  is  another  sense,  no  less  powerful  for  conviction,  in  which 
it  still  suffices  to  say,  in  answer  to  all  doubts,  "Come  and  see."  Come 
and  see  a  dying  world  revivified,  a  decrepit  world  regenerated,  an  aged 
world  rejuvenescent ;  come  and  see  the  darkness  illuminated,  the 
despair  dispelled  ;  come  and  see  tenderness  brought  into  the  cell  of  the 
imprisoned  felon,  and  liberty  to  the  fettered  slave ;  come  and  see  the 
poor,  and  the  ignorant,  and  the  many,  emancipated  for  ever  from  the 
intolerable  thraldom  of  the  rich,  the  learned,  and  the  few ;  come  and 
see  hospitals  and  orphanages  rising  in  their  permanent  mercy  beside 
the  crumbling  ruins  of  colossal  amphitheatres  which  once  reeked  with 
human  blood ;  come  and  see  the  obscene  symbols  of  an  universal 
degradation  obliterated  indignantly  from  the  purified  abodes ;  come 
and  see  the  dens  of  lust  and  tyranny  transformed  into  sweet  and  happy 
homes,  defiant  atheists  into  believing  Christians,  rebels  into  children, 
and  pagans  into  saints.  Ay,  come  and  see  the  majestic  acts  of  one 
great  drama  continued  through  nineteen  Christian  centuries ;  and  as 
you  see  them  all  tending  to  one  great  development,  long  predetermined 
in  the  Council  of  the  Divine  Will — as  you  learn  in  reverent  humility 
that  even  apparent  Chance  is  in  reality  the  daughter  of  Forethought,  as 
well  as,  for  those  who  thus  recognise  her  nature,  the  sister  of  Order  > 
and  Persuasion — as  you  hear  the  voice  of  your  Saviour  searching,  with 


72  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

the  loving  accents  of  a  compassion  which,  will  neither  strive  nor  cry> 
your  very  reins  and  heart — it  may  be  that  you  too  will  unlearn  the 
misery  of  doubt,  and  exclaim  in  calm  and  happy  confidence,  with  the 
pure  and  candid  Nathanael,  "  Rabbi,  tliou  art  the  Son  of  God,  thou  art 
the  King  of  Israel !  " 

The  fastidious  reluctance  of  Nathanael  was  very  soon  dispelled. 
Jesus,  as  He  saw  him  coming,  recognised  that  the  seal  of  God  was 
upon  his  forehead,  and  said  of  him,  "  Behold  a  true  Israelite,  in  whom 
guile  is  not."  "  Whence  dost  thou  recognise  me  ?  "  asked  Nathanacl ; 
and  then  came  that  heart-searching  answer,  "  Before  that  Philip  called 
thee,  whilst  thou  wert  under  the  fig-tree,  I  saw  thee." 

It  was  the  custom  of  pious  Jews — a  custom  approved  by  the 
Talmud — to  study  their  crishma,  or  office  of  daily  prayer,  under  a 
fig-tree ;  and  some  have  imagined  that  there  is  something  significant 
in  the  fact  of  the  Apostle  having  been  summoned  from  the  shade  of  a 
tree  which  symbolised  Jewish  ordinances  and  Jewish  traditions,  but 
which  was  beginning  already  to  cumber  the  ground.  But  though 
something  interesting  and  instructive  may  often  be  derived  from  the 
poetic  insight  of  a  chastened  imagination,  which  can  thus  observe 
allegories  which  lie  involved  in  the  simplest  facts,  yet  no  such  flash 
of  sudden  perception  could  alone  have  accounted  for  the  agitated 
intensity  of  Nathanael's  reply.  Every  one  must  have  been  struck 
at  first  sight,  with  the  apparent  disproportionateness  between  the 
cause  and  the  effect.  How  apparently  inadequate  was  that  quiet 
allusion  to  the  lonely  session  of  silent  thought  under  the  fig-tree,  to 
produce  the  instantaneous  adhesion,  the  henceforth  inalienable  loyalty, 
of  this  "fusile  Apostle  "  to  the  Son  of  God,  the  King  of  Israel !  But 
for  the  true  explanation  of  this  instantaneity  of  conviction,  we  must 
look  deeper ;  and  then,  if  I  mistake  not,  we  shall  see  in  this  incident 
another  of  those  indescribable  touches  of  reality  which  have  been  to 
so  many  powerful  minds  the  most  irresistible  internal  evidence  to 
establish  the  historic  truthfulness  of  the  Fourth  Gospel. 

There  are  moments  when  the  grace  of  God  stirs  sensibly  in  the 
human  heart ;  when  the  soul  seems  to  rise  upon  the  eagle- wings  of 
hope  and  prayer  into  the  heaven  of  heavens ;  when  caught  up,  as  it 
were,  into  God's  very  presence,  we  see  and  hear  things  unspeakable. 
At  such  moments  we  live  a  lifetime;  for  emotions  such  as  these 
annihilate  all  time ;  they — 

"  Crowd  Eternity  into  an  hour, 
Or  stretch  an  hour  into  Eternity." 

At  sach  moments  we  are  nearer  to  God ;   we  seem  to  know  Him  and 


THE   LIFE  OF  CHRIST.  73 

be  known  of  Him;  and  if  it  were  possible  for  any  man  at  such  a 
moment  to  see  into  our  souls,  he  would  know  all  that  is  greatest  and 
most  immortal  in  our  beings.  Bat  to  see  us  then  is  impossible  to 
man ;  it  is  possible  only  to  Him  whose  hand  should  lead,  whose  right 
hand  should  guide  us,  even  if  we  could  take  the  wings  of  the  morning 
and  fly  into  the  uttermost  parts  of  the  sea.  And  such  a  crisis  of 
emotion  must  the  guileless  Israelite  have  known  as  he  sat  and  prayed 
and  mused  in  silence  under  his  fig-tree.  To  the  consciousness  of  such 
a  crisis — a  crisis  which  could  only  be  known  to  One  to  whom  it  was 
given  to  read  the  very  secrets  of  the  heart — our  Lord  appealed.  Let 
liim  who  has  had  a  similar  experience  say  how  he  would  regard  a 
living  maa  who  could  reveal  to  him  that  he  had  at  such  a  moment 
looked  into  and  fathomed  the  emotions  of  his  heart.  That  such 
solitary  musings — such  penetrating,  even  in  this  life,  "behind  the 
vail " — such  raptures  into  the  third  heaven  during  which  the  soul 
strives  to  transcend  the  limitations  of  space  and  time  while  it  com- 
munes, face  to  face,  with  the  Eternal  and  the  Unseen — such  sudden 
kindlings  of  celestial  lightning  which  seem  to  have  fused  all  that  is 
meanest  and  basest  within  us  in  an  instant  and  for  ever — that  these 
supreme  crises  are  among  the  recorded  experiences  of  the  Christian 
life,  rests  upon  indisputable  evidence  of  testimony  and  of  fact.  And 
if  any  one  of  my  readers  has  ever  known  this  spasm  of  divine  change 
which  annihilates  the  old  and  in  the  same  moment  creates  or  re-creates 
a  new-born  soul,  such  a  one,  at  least,  will  understand  the  thrill  of 
electric  sympathy,  the  arrow-point  of  intense  conviction,  that  shot 
that  very  instant  through  the  heart  of  Nathanael,  and  brought  him,  as 
it  were,,  at  once  upon  his  knees  with  the  exclamation,  "  Rabbi,  thou  art 
the  Son  of  God,  thou  art  the  King  of  Israel  !  " 

We  scarcely  hear  of  Nathanael  again.  His  seems  to  have  been  one 
of  those  calm,  retiring,  contemplative  souls,  whose  whole  sphere  of 
existence  lies  not  here,  but — 

"  Where,  beyond  these  voices,  there  is  peace." 

It  was  a  life  of  which  the  world  sees  nothing,  because  it  was  "hid 
with  Christ  in  God ;  "  but  of  this  we  may  be  sure,  that  never  till  the 
day  of  his  martyrdom,  or  even  during  his  martyr  agonies,  did  he 
forget  those  quiet  words  which  showed  that  his  "  Lord  had  searched 
him  out  and  known  him,  and  comprehended  his  thoughts  long  before." 
Not  once,  doubtless,  but  on  many  and  many  a  future  day,  was  tho 
promise  fulfilled  for  him  and  for  his  companions,  that,  with  the  eye  of 
faith,  they  should  "  see  the  heavens  opened,  and  the  angels  of  God 
ascending  and  descending  upon  the  Son  of  Man." 


74  THE    LIFE    OF  CHEIST. 

CHAPTER  XI. 

THE     FIRST     MIBACLE. 

"  ON  the  third  day,"  says  St.  John,  "  there  was  a  marriage  in  Cana  of 
Galilee."  "Writing  with  a  full  knowledge  and  vivid  recollection  of 
every  fact  that  took  place  during  those  divinely  memorable  days,  he 
gives  his  indications  of  time  as  though  all  were  equally  familiar  with 
them.  The  third  day  has  been  understood  in  different  manners :  it  is 
simplest  to  understand  it  as  the  third  after  the  departure  of  Jesus 
for  Galilee.  If  He  were  travelling  expeditiously  He  might  stop  on  the 
first  night  (supposing  him  to  follow  the  ordinary  route)  at  Shiloh  or 
at  Shechem ;  on  the  second  at  En-Gannim  ;  on  the  third,  crossing  the 
plain  of  Jezreel,  He  could  easily  reach  Nazareth,  and  finding  that  His 
mother  and  brethren  were  not  there,  might,  in  an  hour  and  a  half 
longer,  reach  Cana  in  time  for  the  ceremonies  of  an  Oriental  wedding. 
It  is  well  known  that  those  ceremonies  began  at  twilight.  It  was 
the  custom  in  Palestine,  no  less  than  in  Greece, 

"  To  bear  away 
The  bride  from  home  at  blushing  shut  of  day," 

or  even  later,  far  on  into  the  night,  covered  from  head  to  foot  in  her 
loose  and  flowing  veil,  garlanded  with  flowers,  and  dressed  in  her 
fairest  robes.  She  was  heralded  by  torchlight,  with  songs  and  dances, 
and  the  music  of  the  drum  and  flute,  to  the  bridegroom's  home.  She 
was  attended  by  the  maidens  of  her  village,  and  the  bridegroom  came 
to  meet  her  with  his  youthful  friends.  Legend  says  that  Nathanael 
was  on  this  occasion  the  paranymph,  whose  duty  it  was  to  escort  the 
bride;  but  the  presence  of  Mary,  who  must  have  left  Nazareth  on  pur- 
pose to  be  present  at  the  wedding,  seems  to  show  that  one  of  the  bridal 
pair  was  some  member  of  the  Holy  Family.  Jesus  too  was  invited,  and 
His  disciples,  and  the  use  of  the  singular  (efcTujdij)  implies  that  they 
were  invited  for  His  sake,  not  He  for  theirs.  It  is  not  likely,  there- 
fore, that  Nathanael,  who  had  only  heard  the  name  of  Jesus  two  days 
before,  had  anything  to  do  with  the  marriage.  All  positive  conjecture 
is  idle ;  but  the  fact  that  the  Virgin  evidently  took  a  leading  position 
in  the  house,  and  commands  the  servants  in  a  tone  of  authority, 
renders  it  not  improbable  that  this  may  have  been  the  wedding  of  one 
of  her  nephews,  the  sons  of  Alphrous,  or  even  of  one  of  her  daughters, 
"  the  sisters  of  Jesus,"  to  whom  tradition  gives  the  names  Esther  and 
Thamar.  That  Joseph  himself  was  dead  is  evident  from  the  complete 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHlilST.  75 

silence  of  the  Evangelists,  who  after  Christ's  first  visit  to  Jerusalem 
as  a  boy,  make  no  further  mention  of  his  name. 

Whether  the  marriage  festival  lasted  for  seven  days,  as  was  usual 
among  those  who  could  afford  it,  or  only  for  one  or  two,  as  was  the 
case  among  the  poorer  classes,  we  cannot  tell ;  but  at  some  period  of 
the  entertainment  the  wine  suddenly  ran  short.  None  but  those  who 
know  how  sacred  in  the  East  is  the  duty  of  lavish  hospitality,  and  how 
passionately  the  obligation  to  exercise  it  to  the  utmost  is  felt,  can 
realise  the  gloom  which  this  incident  would  have  thrown  over  the 
occasion,  or  the  misery  and  mortification  which  it  would  have  caused 
to  the  wedded  pair.  They  would  have  felt  it  to  be,  as  in  the  East  it 
would  still  be  felt  to  be,  a  bitter  and  indelible  disgrace. 

Now  the  presence  of  Jesus  and  his  five  disciples  may  well  have 
been  the  cause  of  this  unexpected  deficiency.  The  invitation,  as  we 
have  seen,  was  originally  intended  for  Jesus  alone,  nor  could  the 
youthful  bridegroom  in  Cana  of  Galilee  have  been  in  the  least  aware 
that  during  the  last  four  days  Jesus  had  won  the  allegiance  of  five 
disciples.  It  is  probable  that  no  provision  had  been  made  for  this 
increase  of  numbers,  and  that  it  was  their  unexpected  presence  which 
caused  the  deficiency  in  this  simple  household.  Moreover,  it  is  hardly 
probable  that,  coming  from  a  hasty  journey  of  ninety  miles,  the  little 
band  could,  even  had  their  means  permitted  it,  have  conformed  to  the 
common  Jewish  custom  of  bringing  with  them  wine  and  other  pro- 
visions to  contribute  to  the  mirthfulness  of  the  wedding  feast. 

Under  these  circumstances,  therefore,  there  was  a  special  reason 
why  the  mother  of  Jesus  should  say  to  Him,  "  They  have  no  wine." 
The  remark  was  evidently  a  pointed  one,  and  its  import  could  not  be 
misunderstood.  None  knew,  as  Mary  knew,  who  her  Son  was;  yet 
for  thirty  long  years  of  patient  waiting  for  this  manifestation,  she  had 
but  seen  Him  grow  as  other  children  grow,  and  live,  in  sweetness 
indeed  and  humility  and  grace  of  sinless  wisdom,  like  a  tender  plant 
before  God,  but  in  all  other  respects  as  other  youths  have  lived,  pre- 
eminent only  in  utter  stainlessness.  But  now  He  was  thirty  years 
old ;  the  voice  of  the  great  Prophet,  with  whose  fame  the  nation  rang, 
had  proclaimed  Him  to  be  the  promised  Christ ;  He  was  being  publicly 
attended  by  disciples  who  acknowledged  Him  as  Rabbi  and  Lord. 
Here  was  a  difficulty  to  be  met ;  an  act  of  true  kindness  to  be  per- 
formed ;  a  disgrace  to  be  averted  from  friends  whom  He  loved — and 
that  too  a  disgrace  to  which  His  own  presence  and  that  of  His  disciples 
had  unwittingly  contributed.  Was  not  His  hour  yet  come  ?  Who 
could  tell  what  He  might  do,  if  He  were  only  made  aware  of  the 


7G  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

trouble  which  threatened  to  interrupt  the  feast  ?  Might  not  some 
band  of  hymning  angels,  like  the  radiant  -visions,  who  had  heralded 
His  birth,  receive  His  bidding  to  change  that  humble  marriage-feast 
into  a  scene  of  heaven  ?  Might  it  not  bo  that  even  now  He  would 
lead  them  into  His  banquet-house,  and  His  banner  over  them  be 
love  ? 

Her  faith  was  strong,  her  motives  pure,  except  perhaps  what  has 
been  called  "the  slightest  possible  touch  of  the  purest  womanly, 
motherly  anxiety  (we  know  no  other  word)  prompting  in  her  the 
desire  to  see  her  Son  honoured  in  her  presence."  And  her  Son's  hour 
had  nearly  come  :  but  it  was  necessary  now,  at  once,  for  ever,  for  that 
Son  to  show  to  her  that  henceforth  he  was  not  Jesus  the  Son  of  Mary, 
but  the  Christ  the  Son  of  God ;  that  as  regarded  His  great  work  and 
mission,  as  regarded  His  Eternal  Being,  the  significance  of  the  beautiful 
relationship  had  passed  away;  that  His  thoughts  were  not  as  her 
thoughts,  neither  His  ways  her  ways.  It  could  not  have  been  done  in 
a  manner  more  decisive,  yet  at  the  same  time  more  entirely  tender. 

"Woman,  what  have  I  to  do  with  thee  ?"  The  words  at  first  sound 
harsh,  and  almost  repellent  in  their  roughness  and  brevity ;  but  that 
is  the  fault  partly  of  our  version,  partly  of  our  associations.  He  does 
not  call  her  "mother,"  because,  in  circumstances  such  as  these,  she 
was  His  mother  no  longer  ;  but  the  address  "  Woman  "  (Pwai)  was 
so  respectful  that  it  might  be,  and  was,  addressed  to  the  queenliest, 
and  so  gentle  that  it  might  be,  and  was,  addressed  at  the  tenderest 
moments  to  the  most  fondly  loved.  And  "what  have  I  to  do  with 
thee?  "  is  a  literal  version  of  a  common  Aramaic  phrase  (mah  li  veldJt), 
which,  while  it  sets  aside  a  suggestion  and  waives  all  further  dis- 
cussion of  it,  is  yet  perfectly  consistent  with  the  most  delicate  courtesy 
and  the  most  feeling  consideration. 

Nor  can  we  doubt  that  even  the  slight  check  involved  in  these 
quiet  words  was  still  more  softened  by  the  look  and  accent  with  which 
they  were  spoken,  and  which  are  often  sufficient  to  prevent  far  harsher 
utterances  from  inflicting  any  pain.  For  with  undiminished  faith,  and 
with  no  trace  of  pained  feeling,  Mary  said  to  the  servants — over  whom 
it  is  clear  she  was  exercising  some  authority — "  Whatever  He  says  to 
you,  do  it  at  once." 

The  first  necessity  after  a  journey  in  the  East  is  to  wash  the  feet, 
arid  before  a  meal  to  wash  the  hands  ;  and  to  supply  these  wants  there 
were  standing  (as  still  is  usual),  near  the  entrance  of  the  house,  six 
large  stone  water- jars,  with  their  orifices  filled  with  bunches  of  fresh 
green  leaves  to  keep  the  water  cool.  Each  of  these  jars  contained  two 


THE   LIFE   OF   CUUIST.  77 

or  three  laths  of  water,  and  Jesus  bade  the  servants  at  once  fill  them 
to  the  brim.  They  did  so,  and  He  then  ordered  them  to  draw  out  the 
contents  in  smaller  vessels,  and  carry  it  to  the  guest  who,  according  to 
the  festive  custom  of  the  time,  had  been  elected  "  governor  of  the 
feast."  Knowing  nothing  of  what  had  taken  place,  he  mirthfully 
observed  that  in  offering  the  good  wine  last,  the  bridegroom  had 
violated  the  common  practice  of  banquets.  This  was  Christ's  first 
miracle,  and  thus,  with  a  definite  and  symbolic  purpose,  did  Ho 
manifest  His  glory,  and  His  disciples  believed  on  Him. 

It  was  His  first  miracle,  yet  how  unlike  all  that  wo  should  have 
expected  ;  how  simply  unobtrusive,  how  divinely  calm  !  The  method, 
indeed,  of  the  miracle — which  is  far  more  wonderful  in  character  than 
the  ordinary  miracles  of  healing — transcends  our  powers  of  conception ; 
yet  it  was  not  done  with  any  pomp  of  circumstance,  or  blaze  of  adven- 
titious glorification.  Men  in  these  days  have  presumptuously  talked 
as  though  it  were  God's  duty — the  duty  of  Him  to  whom  the  sea  and 
the  mountains  are  a  very  little  thing,  and  before  whose  eyes  the  starry 
heaven  is  but  as  one  white  gleam  in  the  "  intense  inane  " — to  perform 
His  miracles  before  a  circle  of  competent  savans !  Conceivably  it 
mifjht  be  so  had  it  been  intended  that  miracles  should  be  the  sole,  or 

O  ' 

even  the  main,  credentials,  of  Christ's  authority ;  but  to  the  belief  of 
Christendom  the  son  of  God  would  still  be  the  Son  of  God  even  if,  like 
John,  He  had  done  no  miracle.  The  miracles  of  Christ  were  miracles 
addressed,  not  to  a  cold  and  sceptic  curiosity,  but  to  a  loving  and 
humble  faith.  They  needed  not  the  acuteness  of  the  impostor,  or  tho 
self-assertion  of  the  thaumaturge.  They  were  indeed  the  signs — 
almost,  we  had  said,  the  accidental  signs — of  His  divine  mission ;  but 
their  primary  object  was  the  alleviation  of  human  suffering,  or  tho 
illustration  of  sacred  truths,  or,  as  in  this  instance,  the  increase  of 
innocent  joy.  An  obscure  village,  an  ordinary  wedding,  a  humble 
home,  a  few  faithful  peasant  guests — such  a  scene,  and  no  splendid 
amphitheatre  or  stately  audience,  beheld  one  of  Christ's  greatest 
miracles  of  power.  And  in  these  respects  the  circumstances  of  tho 
First  Miracle  are  exactly  analogous  to  the  supernatural  events  recorded 
of  Christ's  birth.  In  the  total  unlikeness  of  this  to  all  that  we  should 
have  imagined — in  its  absolute  contrast  with  anything  which  legend 
would  have  invented — in  all,  in  short,  which  most  offends  the  unbe- 
liever, we  see  but  fresh  confirmation  that  we  are  reading  the  words  of 
soberness  and  truth. 

A  miracle  is  a  miracle,  and  we  see  no  possible  advantage  in  trying 
to  understand  the  means  by  which  it  was  wrought.     In  accepting  tho 


78  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

evidence  for  it — and  it  is  for  each  man  to  be  fully  persuaded  in  his  own 
mind,  and  to  accept  or  to  reject  at  his  pleasure,  perhaps  even  it  may 
prove  to  be  at  his  peril — we  are  avowedly  accepting  the  evidence  for 
something  which  transcends,  though  it  by  no  means  necessarily  super-^ 
sedfis,  the  ordinary  laws  by  which  Nature  works.  What  is  gained — 
in  what  single  respect  does  the  miracle  become,  so  to  speak,  easier 
or  more  comprehensible — by  supposing,  with  Olshausen,  that  we 
have  here  only  an  accelerated  process  of  nature  ;  or  with  Neander 
(apparently),  that  the  water  was  magnetised ;  or  with  Lange  (appa- 
rently), that  the  guests  were  in  a  state  of  supernatural  exaltation  ? 
Let  those  who  find  it  intellectually  possible,  or  spiritually  advan- 
tageous, freely  avail  themselves  of  such  hypotheses  if  they  see  their 
way  to  do  so  :  to  us  they  seem,  not  "  irreverent,"  not  "  rationalistic," 
not  "dangerous,"  but  simply  embarrassing  and  needless.  To  denounce 
them  as  unfaithful  concessions  to  the  spirit  of  scepticism  may  suit  the 
exigencies  of  a  violent  and  Pharisaic  theology,  but  is  unworthy  of  that 
calm  charity  which  should  be  the  fairest  fruit  of  Christian  faith.  In 
matters  of  faith  it  ought  to  be  to  every  one  of  us  "  a  very  small  thing 
to  be  judged  of  you  or  of  man's  judgment ;  "  we  ought  to  believe,  or 
disbelieve,  or  modify  belief,  with  sole  reference  to  that  which,  in  our 
hearts  and  consciences,  we  feel  to  be  the  will  of  God  ;  and  it  is  by  His 
judgment,  and  by  His  alone,  that  we  should  care  to  stand  or  to  fall. 
We  as  little  claim  a  right  to  scathe  the  rejector  of  miracles  by  abuse 
and  anathema,  as  we  admit  his  right  to  sneer  at  us  for  imbecility  or 
hypocrisy.  Jesus  has  taught  to  all  men,  whether  they  accept  or  reject 
Him,  the  lessons  of  charity  and  sweetness ;  and  what  the  believer  and 
the  unbeliever  alike  can  do,  is  calmly,  temperately,  justly,  and  with 
perfect  and  solemn  sincerity — knowing  how  deep  are  the  feelings  in- 
volved, and  how  vast  the  issues  at  stake  between  us — to  state  the 
reason  for  the  belief  that  is  jn  hirn.  And  this  being  so,  I  would  say 
that  if  we  once  understand  that  the  word  Nature  has  little  or  no 
meaning  unless  it  bo  made  to  include  the  idea  of  its  Author ;  if  we 
once  realise  the  fact,  which  all  science  teaches  us,  that  the  very 
simplest  and  most  elementary  operation  of  the  laws  of  Nature  is 
infinitely  beyond  the  comprehension  of  our  most  exalted  intelligence ; 
if  we  once  believe  that  the  Divine  Providence  of  God  is  no  far-off 
abstraction,  but  a  living  and  loving  care  over  the  lives  of  man  ;  lastly, 
if  we  once  believe  that  Christ  was  the  only-begotten  Son  of  God,  the 
Word  of  God,  who  came  to  reveal  and  declare  His  Father  to  mankind, 
then  there  is  nothing  in  any  Gospel  miracle  to  shock  our  faith  •  we 
',  shall  regard  the  miracles  of  Christ  as  resulting  from  the  fact  of  His 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  79 

Being  and  His  mission,  no  less  naturally  and  inevitably  than  tlie  rays 
of  light  stream  outwards  from  the  sun.  They  were,  to  use  the 
favourite  expression  of  St.  John,  not  merely  "  portents  "  (repara),  or 
powers  (8uyayu,a9),  or  signs  (o-rjpeia),  but  they  were  works  (e/cxya), 
the  ordinary  and  inevitable  works  (whenever  He  chose  to  exercise 
them)  of  One  whose  very  existence  was  the  highest  miracle  of  all. 
For  our  faith  is  that  He  was  sinless ;  and  to  borrow  the  words  of  a 
German  poet,  "  one  might  have  thought  that  the  miracle  of  miracles 
was  to  have  created  the  world  such  as  it  is ;  yet  it  is  a  far  greater 
miracle  to  have  lived  a  perfectly  pure  life  therein."  The  greatest  of 
modern  philosophers  said  that  there  were  two  things  which  over- 
whelmed his  soul  with  awe  and  astonishment,  "  the  starry  heaven 
above,  and  the  moral  law  within ; "  but  to  these  has  been  added  a 
third  reality  no  less  majestic — the  fulfilment  of  the  moral  law  ivithout 
us  in  the  Person  of  Jesus  Christ.  That  fulfilment  makes  us  believe 
that  He  was  indeed  Divine;  and  if  He  were  Divine,  we  have  no 
further  astonishment  left  when  we  are  taught  that  He  did  on  earth 
that  which  can  be  done  by  the  Power  of  God  alone. 

But  there  are  two  characteristics  of  this  first  miracle  which  we 
ought  to  notice. 

One  is  its  divine  unselfishness.  His  ministry  is  to  be  a  ministry 
of  joy  and  peace ;  His  sanction  is  to  be  given  not  to  a  crushing 
asceticism,  but  to  a  genial  innocence ;  His  approval,  not  to  a  com- 
pulsory celibacy,  but  to  a  sacred  union.  He  who,  to  appease  His  own 
sore  hunger,  would  not  turn  the  stones  of  the  wilderness  into  bread, 
gladly  exercises,  for  the  sake  of  others,  His  transforming  power ;  and 
but  six  or  seven  days  afterwards,  relieves  the  perplexity  and  sorrow 
of  a  humble  wedding  feast  by  turning  water  into  wine.  The  first  <s 
miracle  of  Moses  was,  in  stern  retribution,  to  turn  the  river  of  a 
guilty  nation  into  blood;  the  first  of  Jesus  to  fill  the  water-jars  of 
an  innocent  family  with  wine. 

And  the  other  is  its  symbolic  character.  Like  nearly  all  the 
miracles  of  Christ,  it  combines  the  characteristics  of  a  work  of 
mercy,  an  emblem,  and  a  prophecy.  The  world  gives  its  best  first, 
and  afterwards  all  the  dregs  and  bitterness ;  but  Christ  came  to  turn 
the  lower  into  the  richer  and  sweeter,  the  Mosaic  law  into  the  perfect 
law  of  liberty,  the  baptism  of  John  into  the  baptism  with  the  Holy 
Ghost  and  with  fire,  the  self-denials  of  a  painful  isolation  into  the 
self-denials  of  a  happy  homo,  sorrow  and  sighing  into  hope  and  bless- 
ing, and  water  into  wine.  And  thus  the  "  holy  estate  "  which  Christ 
adorned  and  beautified  with  His  presence  and  first  miracle  in  Cana 


80  )  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 


of  Galiloo,  foreshadows  tlie  mystical  union  between  Christ  and  His 
Church ;  and  the  common  element  which  he  thus  miraculously  changed 
becomes  a  type  of  our  life  on  earth  transfigured  and  ennobled  by  the 
anticipated  joys  of  heaven — a  type  of  that  wine  which  He  shall 
drink  new  with  us  in  the  kingdom  of  God,  at  the  marriage  supper 
of  the  Lamb. 


CHAPTER  XII. 

THE   SCENE   OP  THE  MINISTRY. 

CHRIST'S  first  miracle  of  Cana  was  a  sign  that  He  came,  not  to  call  His 
disciples  out  of  the  world  and  its  ordinary  duties,  but  to  make  men 
happier,  nobler,  better  in  the  world.  He  willed  that  they  should  be 
husbands,  and  fathers,  and  citizens,  not  eremites  or  monks.  He  would 
show  that  he  approved  the  brightness  of  pure  society,  and  the  mirth 
of  innocent  gatherings,  no  less  than  the  ecstacies  of  the  ascetic  in  the 
wilderness,  or  the  visions  of  the  mystic  in  his  solitary  cell. 

And,  as  pointing  the  same  moral,  there  was  something  significant 
in  the  place  which  He  chose  as  the  scene  of  His  earliest  ministry.  St. 
John  had  preached  in  the  lonely  wastes  by  the  Dead  Sea  waters ;  his 
voice  had  been  echoed  back  by  the  flinty  precipices  that  frown  over 
the  sultry  Ghor.  The  city  nearest  to  the  scene  of  His  teaching  had 
been  built  in  defiance  of  a  curse,  and  the  road  to  it  led  through  "  tho 
bloody  way."  All  around  him  breathed  the  dreadful  associations  of  a 
guilty  and  desolated  past ;  the  very  waves  were  bituminous ;  the  very 
fruits  crumbled  into  foul  ashes  under  the  touch;  the  very  dust 
beneath  his  feet  lay,  hot  and  white,  over  the  relics  of  an  abominable 
race.  There,  beside  those  leaden  waters,  under  that  copper  heaven, 
amid  those  burning  wildernesses  and  scarred  ravines,  had  he  preached 
the  baptism  of  repentance.  But  Christ,  amid  the  joyous  band  of  His 
mother,  and  His  brethren,  and  His  disciples,  chose  as  the  earliest 
centre  of  His  ministry  a  bright  and  busy  city,  whose  marble  buildings 
were  mirrored  in  a  limpid  sea. 

That  little  city  was  Capernaum.  It  rose  under  the  gentle  de- 
clivities of  hills  that  encircled  an  earthly  Paradise.  There  were  no 
such  trees,  and  no  such  gardens,  anywhere  in  Palestine  as  in  tho  land 


TUB   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  81 

of  Genncsarcth.  The  very  name  means  "  garden  of  abundance,"  and 
the  numberless  flowers  blossom  over  a  little  plain  which  is  "in  sight 
like  unto  an  emerald."  It  was  doubtless  a  part  of  Christ's  divine  plan 
that  His  ministry  should  begin  amid  scenes  so  beautiful,  and  that  the 
good  tidings,  which  revealed  to  mankind  their  loftiest  hopes  and 
purest  pleasures,  should  be  first  proclaimed  in  a  region  of  unusual 
loveliness.  The  features  of  the  scene  are  neither  gorgeous  nor 
colossal ;  there  is  nothing  here  of  the  mountain  gloom  or  the  moun- 
tain glory  ;  nothing  of  that  "  dread  magnificence  "  which  overawes  us 
as  we  gaze  on  the  icy  precipices  of  tropical  volcanoes,  or  the  icy 
precipices  of  northern  hills.  Had  our  life  on  earth  been  full  of  wild 
and  terrible  catastrophes,  then  it  might  have  been  fitly  symbolised  by 
scenes  which  told  only  of  deluge  and  conflagration ;  but  these  green 
pastures  and  still  waters,  these  bright  birds  and  flowering  oleanders, 
the  dimpling  surface  of  that  inland  sea,  so  doubly  delicious  and 
refreshful  in  a  sultry  land,  all  correspond  with  the  characteristics  of  a 
life  composed  of  innocent  and  simple  elements,  and  brightened  with 
the  ordinary  pleasures  which,  like  the  rain  and  the  sunshine,  are 
granted  to  all  alike. 

What  the  traveller  will  sec,  as  he  emerges  from  the  Valley  of 
Doves,  and  catches  his  first- eager  glimpse  of  Gennesareth,  will  be  a 
small  inland  sea,  like  a  harp  in  shape,  thirteen  miles  long  and  six 
broad.  On  the  farther  or  eastern  side  runs  a  green  strip  about  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  in  breadth,  beyond  which  rises,  to  the  height  of 
some  900  feet  above  the  level  of  the  lake,  an  escarpment  of  desolate 
hills,  scored  with  grey  ravines,  without  tree,  or  village,  or  vestige  of 
cultivation — the  frequent  scene  of  our  Lord's  retirement  when,  after 
His  weary  labours,  He  sought  the  deep  refreshment  of  solitude  with 
God.  The  lake — with  its  glittering  crystal  and  fringe  of  flowering 
oleanders,  through  whose  green  leaves  shine  the  bright  blue  wings  of 
the  roller-bird,  and  the  kingfishers  may  be  seen  in  multitudes  dashing 
down  at  the  fish  that  glance  beneath  them — lies  at  the  bottom  of  a 
great  dent  or  basin  in  the  earth's  surface,  more  than  500  feet  below 
the  level  of  the  Mediterranean.  Hence  the  burning  and  enervating 
heat  of  the  valley ;  but  hence,  too,  the  variety  of  its  foliage,  the 
fertility  of  its  soil,  the  luxuriance  of  its  flora,  the  abundant  harvests 
that  ripen  a  month  earlier  than  they  do  elsewhere,  and  the  number  of 
rivulets  that  tumble  down  the  hill-sides  into  the  lake.  The  shores  arc 
now  deserted.  With  the  exception  of  the  small  and  decaying  town 
of  Tiberias — crumbling  into  the  last  stage  of  decrepitude — and  the 
"frightful  village"  of  Mejdel  (the  ancient  Magdala),  where  the 


82  THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

degradation  of  the  inhabitants  is  best  shown  by  the  fact  that  the 
children  play  stark  naked  in  the  street — there  is  not  a  single  inhabited 
apot  on  its  once  crowded  shores.  One  miserable,  crazy  boat — and  that 
not  always  procnrable — has  replaced  its  gay  and  numerous  fleet.  As 
the  fish  are  still  abundant,  no  fact  could  show  more  clearly  the 
dejected  inanity  and  apathetic  enervation  of  the  present  dwellers  upon 
its  shores.  But  the  natural  features  still  remain.  The  lake  still  lies 
unchanged  in  the  bosom  of  the  hills,  reflecting  every  varying  gleam  of 
the  atmosphere  like  an  opal  set  in  emeralds ;  the  waters  are  still  as 
beautiful  in  their  clearness  as  when  the  boat  of  Peter  lay  rocking  on 
uheir  ripples,  and  Jesus  gazed  into  their  crystal  depths  ;  the  cup-like 
basin  still  seems  to  overflow  with  its  flood  of  sunlight ;  the  air  is  still 
balmy  with  natural  perfumes ;  the  turtle-dove  still  murmurs  in  the 
valleys,  and  the  pelican  fishes  in  the  waves ;  and  there  are  palms,  and 
>^reen  fields,  and  streams,  and  grey  heaps  of  ruin.  And  what  it  has 
lost  in  population  and  activity,  it  has  gained  in  solemnity  and  interest. 
If  every  vestige  of  human  habitation  should  disappear  from  beside  it, 
and  the  jackal  and  the  hyena  should  howl  about  the  shattered  frag- 
ments of  the  synagogues  where  once  Christ  taught,  yet  the  fact  that 
He  chose  it  as  the  scene  of  His  opening  ministry  will  give  a  sense  of 
sacredness  and  pathos  to  its  lonely  waters  till  time  shall  be  no  more. 

Yet  widely  different  must  have  been  its  general  aspect  in  the  timo 
of  Christ,  and  far  more  strikingly  beautiful,  because  far  more  richly 
cultivated.  Josephus,  in  a  passage  of  glowing  admiration,  after 
describing  the  sweetness  of  its  waters,  and  the  delicate  temperature 
of  its  air,  its  palms,  and  vines,  and  oranges,  and  figs,  and  almonds,  and 
pomegranates,  and  warm  springs,  says  that  the  seasons  seemed  to 
compete  for  the  honour  of  its  possession,  and  Nature  to  have  created 
it  as  a  kind  of  emulative  challenge,  wherein  she  had  gathered  all  the 
elements  of  her  strength.  The  Talmudists  see  in  the  fact  that  this 
plain — "  the  ambition  of  Nature  " — belonged  to  the  tribe  of  Naphtali, 
a  fulfilment  of  the  Mosaic  blessing,  that  that  tribe  should  be  "  satisfied 
with  favour,  and  full  with  the  blessing  of  the  Lord ; "  and  they  had 
the  proverb,  true  in  a  deeper  sense  than  they  suppose,  that  "  God  had 
created  seven  seas  in  the  land  of  Canaan,  but  one  only — the  Sea  of 
Galilee — had  He  chosen  for  Himself." 

Not,  however,  for  its  beauty  only,  but  because  of  its  centrality,  and 
its  populous  activity,  it  was  admirably  adapted  for  that  ministry  which 
fulfilled  the  old  prophecy  of  Isaiah,  that  "  the  land  of  Zebulun  and  the 
land  of  Naphtali,  beyond  Jordan,  Galilee  of  the  Gentiles,"  should  "  seo 
a  great  light ;"  and  that  to  them  "  who  sat  in  the  region  of  the  shadow 


THK    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  83 

of  death  "  should  "  light  spring  up."  For  Christ  was  to  be,  even  in 
His  own  lifetime,  "  a  light  to  lighten  the  Gentiles,"  as  well  as  "  the 
glory  of  His  people  Israel."  And  people  of  many  nationalities  dwelt 
in  and  encompassed  this  neighbourhood,  because  it  was  "  the  way  of 
the  sea."  "  The  cities,"  says  Josephus,  "  lie  here  very  thick ;  and  the 
very  numerous  villages  are  so  full  of  people,  because  of  the  fertility  of 

the  land that  the  very  smallest  of  them  contain  above 

15,000  inhabitants."  He  adds  that  the  people  were  active,  industrious, 
and  inured  to  war  from  infancy,  cultivating  every  acre  of  their  rich 
and  beautiful  soil.  No  less  than  four  roads  communicated  with  the 
shores  of  the  lake.  One  led  down  the  Jordan  valley  on  the  western 
side;  another,  crossing  a  bridge  at  the  south  of  the  lake,  passed 
through  Peraea  to  the  fords  of  Jordan  near  Jericho;  a  third  led, 
through  Sepphoris,  the  gay  and  rising  capital  of  Galilee,  to  the  famous 
port  of  Accho  on  the  Mediterranean  Sea ;  a  fourth  ran  over  the  moun- 
tains of  Zebulon  to  Nazareth,  and  so  through  the  plain  of  Esdraelon 
to  Samaria  and  Jerusalem.  Through  this  district  passed  the  great 
caravans  on  their  way  from  Egypt  to  Damascus  ;  and  the  heathens 
who  congregated  at  Bethsaida  Julias  and  Caesarea  Philippi  must 
have  been  constantly  seen  in  the  streets  of  Capernaum.  In  the 
time  of  Christ  it  was  for  population  and  activity  "the  manufacturing- 
district"  of  Palestine,  and  the  waters  of  its  lake  were  ploughed 
by  4,000  vessels  of  every  description,  from  the  war-vessel  of 
the  Romans  to  the  rough  fisher-boats  of  Bethsaida  and  the  gilded 
pinnaces  from  Herod's  palace.  Itursea,  Samaria,  Syria,  Phoenicia  were 
immediately  accessible  by  crossing  the  lake,  the  river,  or  the  hills. 
The  town  of  Tiberias,  which  Herod  Antipas  had  built  to  be  the  capital 
of  Galilee,  and  named  in  honour  of  the  reigning  emperor,  had  risen 
with  marvellous  rapidity  ;  by  the  time  that  St.  John  wrote  his  Gospel 
it  had  already  given  its  name  to  the  Sea  of  Galilee ;  and  even  if  Christ 
never  entered  its  heathenish  amphitheatre  or  grave-polluted  streets, 
He  must  often  have  seen  in  the  distance  its  turreted  walls,  its 
strong  castle,  and  the  Golden  House  of  Antipas,  flinging  far  into  the 
lake  the  reflection  of  its  marble  lions  and  sculptured  architraves. 
Europe,  Asia,  and  Africa  had  contributed  to  its  population,  and  men  of 
all  nations  met  in  its  market-place.  All  along  the  western  shores  of 
Gennesareth  Jews  and  Gentiles  were  strangely  mingled,  and  the  wild 
Arabs  of  the  desert  might  there  be  seen  side  by  side  with  enterprising 
Phoenicians,  effeminate  Syrians,  contemptuous  Romans,  and  supple, 
wily,  corrupted  Greeks. 

The  days  of  delightful  seclusion  in  the  happy  valley  of  Nazareth 

G  2 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

ere  past ;  a  life  of  incessant  toil,  of  deep  anxiety,  of  trouble,  and 
wandering,  and  opposition,  of  preaching,  healing,  and  doing  good,  was 
now  to  begin.  At  this  earliest  dawn  of  His  public  entrance  upon  His 
ministry,  our  Lord's  first  stay  in  Capernaum  was  not  for  many  days ; 
yet  these  days  would  be  a  type  of  all  the  remaining  life.  He  would 
preach  in  a  Jewish  synagogue  built  by  a  Roman  centurion,  and  His 
works  of  love  would  become  known  to  men  of  many  nationalities.  It 
would  be  clear  to  all  that  the  new  Prophet  who  had  arisen  was  wholly 
unlike  his  great  forerunner.  The  hairy  mantle,  the  ascetic  seclusion, 
the  unshorn  locks,  would  have  been  impossible  and  out  of  place  among 
the  inhabitants  of  those  crowded  and  busy  shores.  Christ  came  not 
to  revolutionise,  but  to  ennoble  and  to  sanctify.  He  came  to  reveal 
that  the  Eternal  was  not  the  Future,  but  only  the  Unseen;  that 
Eternity  was  no  ocean  whither  men  were  being  swept  by  the  river  of 
Time,  but  was  around  them  now,  and  that  their  lives  were  only  real  in 
so  far  as  they  felt  its  reality  and  its  presence.  He  came  to  teach  that 
God  was  no  dim  abstraction,  infinitely  separated  from  them  in  the  far- 
off  blue,  but  that  He  was  the  father  in  whom  they  lived,  and  moved, 
and  had  their  being ;  and  that  the  service  which  He  loved  was  not 
ritual  and  sacrifice,  not  pompous  scrupulosity  and  censorious  ortho- 
doxy, but  mercy  and  justice,  humility  and  love.  He  came,  not  to  hush 
the  natural  music  of  men's  lives,  nor  to  fill  it  with  storm  and  agitation, 
but  to  re-tune  every  silver  chord  in  that  "harp  of  a  thousand  strings," 
and  to  make  it  echo  with  the  harmonies  of  heaven. 

And  such  being  the  significance  of  Christ's  life  in  this  lovely 
.region,  it  is  strange  that  the  exact  site  of  Capernaum — of  Caper- 
naum, "His  own  city"  (Matt.  ix.  1),  which  witnessed  so  many  of 
His  mightiest  miracles,  which  heard  so  many  of  His  greatest  revela- 
tions— should  remain  to  this  day  a  matter  of  uncertainty.  That  it 
was  indeed  eitlier  at  Khan  Minyeh  or  at  Tell  Hum  is  reasonably 
certain ;  but  at  which  ?  Both  towns  are  in  the  immediate  vicinity 
of  Bethsaida  and  of  Chorazin  ;  both  are  beside  the  waves  of  Galilee ; 
both  lie  on  the  "  way  of  the  sea ; "  the  claims  of  both  are  supported 
by  powerful  arguments ;  the  decision  in  favour  of  either  involves 
difficulties  as  yet  unsolved.  After  visiting  the  scenes,  and  carefully 
studying  on  the  spot  the  arguments  of  travellers  in  many  volumes, 
the  preponderance  of  evidence  seems  to  mo  in  favour  of  Tell  Hum. 
There,  on  bold  rising  ground,  encumbered  with  fragments  of  white 
marble,  rise  the  ruined  walls  of  what  was  perhaps  a  synagogue,  built 
in  the  florid  and  composite  style  which  marks  the  Herodian  age ;  and 
amid  the  rank  grass  and  gigantic  thistles  lie  scattered  the  remnants 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  85 

of  pillars  and  architraves  which  prove  that  on  this  spot  onco  stood  a 
beautiful  and  prosperous  town.  At  Khan  Minjeh  there  is  nothing 
but  a  common  ruined  caravanserai  and  grey  mounded  heaps,  which 
may  or  may  not  be  the  ruins  of  ruins.  But  whichever  of  the  two 
was  the  site  on  which  stood  the  home  of  Peter — which  was  also  the 
home  of  Christ  (Matt.  viii.  14) — either  is  desolate ;  even  the  wander- 
ing Bedawy  seems  to  shun  those  ancient  ruins,  where  the  fox  and  the 
jackal  prowl  at  night.  The  sad  and  solemn  woe  that  was  uttered 
upon  the  then  bright  and  flourishing  city  has  been  fulfilled:  "And 
thou,  Capernaum,  which  art  exalted  to  heaven,  shalt  be  thrust  down 
to  hell :  for  if  the  mighty  works,  which  have  been  done  in,  thee,  had 
been  done  in  Sodom,  it  had  remained  unto  this  day." 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

JESUS  AT  THE    PASSOVER. 

THE  stay  of  Jesus  at  Capernaum  on  this  occasion  was  very  short,  and 
it  is  not  improbable  that  He  simply  awaited  there  the  starting  of  tbe 
great  caravan  of  the  pilgrims,  who,  at  this  time,  were  about  to  wend 
their  way  to  the  great  feast  at  Jerusalem. 

The  Synoptists  are  silent  respecting  any  visit  of  Christ  to  tha 
Passover  between  His  twelfth  year  till  His  death;  and  it  is  St. 
John  alone  who,  true  to  the  purpose  and  characteristics  of  his 
Gospel,  mentions  this  earliest  Passover  of  Christ's  ministry,  or  gives 
us  any  particulars  that  took  place  during  its  progress. 

The  main  event  which  distinguished  it  was  the  purification  of  the 
Temple — an  act  so  ineffectual  to  conquer  the  besetting  vice  of  the  Jews, 
that  He  was  obliged  to  repeat  it,  with  expressions  still  more  stern,  ai 
the  close  of  His  ministry,  and  only  four  days  before  His  death. 

We  have  already  seen  what  vast  crowds  flocked  to  the  Holy  City 
at  the  great  annual  feast.  Then,  as  now,  that  immense  multitude, 
composed  of  pilgrims  from  every  land,  and  proselytes  of  every  nation, 
brought  with  them  many  needs.  The  traveller  who  now  visits 
Jerusalem  at  Easter  time  will  make  his  way  to  the  gates  of  tho 
Church  of  the  Sepulchre  through  a  crowd  of  vendors  of  relics, 
souvenirs,  and  all  kinds  of  objects,  who,  squatting  on  the  ground, 


86  THE    LIFE    OF   CHKIST. 

fill  all  the  vacant  space  before  the  church  and  overflow  into  the 
adjoining  street.  Far  more  numerous  and  far  more  noisome  must 
have  been  the  buyers  and  sellers  who  choked  the  avenues  leading  to 
the  Temple,  in  the  Passover  to  which  Jesus  now  went  among  the  other 
pilgrims  ;  for  what  they  had  to  sell  were  not  only  trinkets  and  knick- 
knacks,  such  as  now  are  sold  to  Eastern  pilgrims,  but  oxen,  and  sheep, 
and  doves.  On  both  sides  of  the  eastern  gate — the  gate  Shusan — as 
for  as  Solomon's  porch,  there  had  long  been  established  the  shops  of 
merchants  and  the  banks  of  money-changers.  The  latter  were  almost 
a  necessity ;  for,  twenty  days  before  the  Passover,  the  priests  began  to 
collect  the  old  sacred  tribute  of  half  a  shekel  paid  yearly  by  every 
Israelite,  whether  rich  or  poor,  as  atonement  money  for  his  soul,  and 
applied  to  the  expenses  of  the  Tabernacle  service.  Now  it  would  not 
.  be  lawful  to  pay  this  in  the  coinage  brought  from  all  kinds  of  govern- 
ments, sometimes  represented  by  wretched  counters  of  brass  and 
copper,  and  always  defiled  with  heathen  symbols  and  heathen  inscrip- 
tions. It  was  lawful  to  send  this  money  to  the  priests  from  a  distance, 
but  every  Jew  who  presented  himself  in  the  Temple  preferred  to  pay 
ifc  in  person.  He  was  therefore  obliged  to  procure  the  little  silver  coin 
in  return  for  his  own  currency,  and  the  money-changers  charged  him 
five  per  cent,  as  the  usual  Jcolbon  or  agio. 

Had  this  trafficking  been  confined  to  the  streets  immediately 
adjacent  to  the  holy  building,  it  would  have  been  excusable,  though 
rot  altogether  seemly.  Such  scenes  are  described  by  heathen  writers 
as  occurring  round  the  Temple  of  Venus  at  Mount  Eryx,  and  of  the 
Syrian  goddess  at  Hierapolis — nay  even,  to  come  nearer  home,  such 
scenes  once  occurred  in  our  own  St.  Paul's.  But  the  mischief  had  not 
stopped  here.  The  vicinity  of  the  Court  of  the  Gentiles,  with  its  broad 
spaces  and  long  arcades,  had  been  too  tempting  to  Jewish  greed.  "VVe 
learn  from  the  Talmud  that  a  certain  Babha  Ben  Buta  had  been  the 
first  to  introduce  "  3,000  sheep  of  the  flocks  of  Kedar  into  the  Mountain 
of  the  House " — i.e.,  into  the  Court  of  the  Gentiles,  and  therefore 
within  the  consecrated  precincts.  The  profane  example  was  eagerly 
followed.  The  chanujoth  of  the  shopkeepers,  the  exchange  booths  of 
the  usurers,  gradually  crept  into  the  sacred  enclosure.  There,  iu  the 
actual  Court  of  the  Gentiles,  steaming  with  heat  in  the  burning  April 
day,  and  filling  the  Temple  with  stench  and  filth,  were  penned  whole 
flocks  of  sheep  and  oxen,  while  the  drovers  and  pilgrims  stood  barter- 
ing and  bargaining  around  them.  There  were  the  men  with  their 
great  wicker  cages  filled  with  doves,  and  under  the  shadow  of  the 
arcades,  formed  by  quadruple  rows  of  Corinthian  columns,  sat  the 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  87 

money-changers  with  their  tables  covered  with  piles  of  various  small 
coins,  while,  as  they  reckoned  and  wrangled  in  the  most  dishonest  of 
trades,  their  greedy  eyes  twinkled  with  the  lust  of  gain.  And  this  was 
the  entrance- court  to  the  Temple  of  the  Most  High !  The  court  which 
was  a  witness  that  that  house  should  be  a  House  of  Prayer  for  all 
nations  had  been  degraded  into  a  place  which,  for  foulness,  was  more 
like  shambles,  and  for  bustling  commerce  more  like  a  densely- crowded 
bazaar;  while  the  lowing  of  oxen,  the  bleating  of  sheep,  the  Babel  of 
many  languages,  the  huckstering  and  wrangling,  and  the  clinking  of 
money  and  of  balances  (perhaps  not  always  just),  might  be  heard  in 
the  adjoining  courts,  disturbing  the  chant  of  the  Levites  and  the 
prayers  of  priests ! 

Filled  with  a  righteous  scorn  at  all  this  mean  irreverence,  burning 
with  irresistible  and  noble  indignation,  Jesus,  on  entering  the  Temple, 
made  a  scourge  of  the  rushes  that  lay  on  the  floor ;  and  in  order  to 
cleanse  the  sacred  court  of  its  worst  pollutions,  first  drove  out,  indis- 
criminately, the  sheep  and  oxen  and  the  low  crowd  who  tended  them. 
Then  going  to  the  tables  of  the  money-changers  He  overthrew  them 
where  they  stood,  upsetting  the  carefully-arranged  heaps  of  hetero- 
geneous coinage,  and  leaving  the  owners  to  grope  and  hunt  for  their 
scattered  money  on  the  polluted  floor.  Even  to  those  who  sold  doves 
He  issued  the  mandate  to  depart,  less  sternly  indeed,  because  the  dove 
was  the  offering  of  the  poor,  and  there  was  less  desecration  and  foul- 
ness in  the  presence  there  of  those  lovely  emblems  of  innocence  and 
purity ;  nor  could  He  overturn  the  tables  of  the  dove-sellers  lest  the 
birds  should  be  hurt  in  their  cages ;  but  still,  even  to  those  who  sold 
doves,  He  authoritatively  exclaimed,  "  Take  these  things  hence," 
justifying  His  action  to  the  whole  terrified,  injured,  muttering,  ignoble 
crowd  in  110  other  words  than  the  high  rebuke,  "  Make  not  my  Father's 
hoitse  a  house  of  merchandise  "  And  His  disciples,  seeing  this  transport 
of  inspiring  and  glorious  anger,  recalled  to  mind  what  David  had 
once  written  "  to  the  chief  musician  upon  Soshannim,"  for  the  service 
of  that  very  Temple,  "  The  zeal  of  thine  house  shall  even  devour  me." 

Why  did  not  this  multitude  of  ignorant  pilgrims  resist  ?  Why 
did  these  greedy  chafferers  content  themselves  with  dark  scowls  and 
muttered  maledictions,  while  they  suffered  their  oxen  and  sheep  to  be 
chased  into  the  streets  and  themselves  ejected,  and  their  money  flung 
rolling  on  the  floor,  by  one  who  was  then  young  and  unknown,  and 
in  the  garb  of  despised  Galilee  ?  Why,  in  the  same  way  we  might 
ask,  did  Saul  suffer  Samuel  to  beard  him  in  the  very  presence  of  His 
army?  Why  did  David  abjectly  obey  the  orders  of  Joab?  Wb,y 


88  THE   LIFE    OF   CHKIST. 

did  Ahab  not  dare  to  arrest  Elijah  at  the  door  of  Naboth's  vineyard  ? 
Because  sin  is  weakness;  because  there  is  in  the  world  nothing  so 
abject  as  a  guilty  conscience,  nothing  so  invincible  as  the  sweeping 
tide  of  a  Godlike  indignation  against  all  that  is  base  and  wrong.  How 
could  these  paltry  sacrilegious  buyers  and  sellers,  conscious  of  wrong- 
doing, oppose  that  scathing  rebuke,  or  face  the  lightnings  of  those 
eyes  that  were  enkindled  by  an  outraged  holiness  ?  When  Phinehas 
the  priest  was  zealous  for  the  Lord  of  Hosts,  and  drove  through  the 
bodies  of  the  prince  of  Simeon  and  the  Midianitish  woman  with  one 
glorious  thrust  of  his  indignant  spear,  why  did  not  guilty  Israel 
avenge  that  splendid  murder  ?  Why  did  not  every  man  of  the  tribe 
of  Simeon  become  a  Goel  to  the  dauntless  assassin  ?  Because  Vice 
cannot  stand  for  one  moment  before  Virtue's  uplifted  arm.  Base  and 
grovelling  as  they  were,  these  money-mongering  Jews  felt,  in  all  that 
remnant  of  their  souls  which  was  not  yet  eaten  away  by  infidelity 
and  avarice,  that  the  Son  of  Man  was  right. 

ITay,  even  the  Priests  and  Pharisees,  and  Scribes  and  Levites, 
devoured  as  they  were  by  pride  and  formalism,  could  not  condemn  an 
act  which  might  have  been  performed  by  a  Nehemiah  or  a  Judas 
Maccaboeus,  and  which  agreed  with  all  that  was  purest  and  best  in 
their  traditions.  But  when  they  had  heard  of  this  deed,  or  witnessed 
it,  and  had  tune  to  recover  from  the  breathless  mixture  of  admiration, 
disgust,  and  astonishment  which  it  inspired,  they  came  to  Jesus,  and 
though  they  did  not  dare  to  condemn  what  He  had  done,  yet  half 
indignantly  asked  Him  for  some  sign  that  He  had  a  right  to  act 
thus. 

Our  Lord's  answer  in  its  full  meaning  was  far  beyond  their  com- 
prehension, and  in  what  appeared  to  be  its  meaning  filled  them  with  a 
perfect  stupor  of  angry  amazement.  "  Destroy,"  Ho  said,  "  this 
temple,  and  in  three  days  I  will  raise  it  up." 

Destroy  this  Temple ! — the  Temple  on  which  a  king  pre-eminent 
for  his  wealth  and  magnificence  had  lavished  his  most  splendid 
resources,  and  thereby  almost  reconciled  the  Jews  to  an  intolerable 
tyranny;  the  Temple  for  the  construction  of  which  one  thousand 
wagons  had  been  required,  and  ten  thousand  workmen  enrolled,  and 
a  thousand  priests  in  sacerdotal  vestments  employed  to  lay  the  stones 
which  the  workmen  had  already  hewn;  the  Temple  which  was  a 
marvel  to  the  world  for  its  colossal  substructions  of  marble,  its  costly 
mosaics,  its  fragrant  woods,  its  glittering  roofs,  the  golden  vine  with 
its  hanging  clusters  sculptured  over  the  entrance  door,  the  embroidered 
vails,  en  woven  with  flowers  of  purple,  the  profuse  magnificence  of  its 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  89 

silver,  gold,  and  precious  stones.  It  had  been  already  forty-six  years 
in  building,  and  was  yet  far  from  finished ;  and  this  unknown  Galilaoan 
youth  bade  them  destroy  it,  and  He  would  raise  it  in  three  days  ! 
Such  was  the  literal  and  evidently  false  construction  which  they  chose 
to  put  upon  his  words,  though  the  recorded  practice  of  their  own  great 
prophets  might  have  shown  them  that  a  mystery  lay  hidden  in  this 
sign  which  Ho  gave. 

How  ineffaceable  was  the  impression  produced  by  the  words  is  best 
proved  by  the  fact  that  more  than  three  years  afterwards  it  was  this, 
more  than  all  His  other  discourses,  which  His  accusers  and  false 
witnesses  tried  to  pervert  into  a  constructive  evidence  of  guilt; 
nay,  it  was  even  this,  more  than  anything  else,  with  which  the 
miserable  robber  taunted  Him  upon  the  very  cross.  They  were 
obliged,  indeed,  entirely  to  distort  His  words  into  "  I  am  able  to 
destroy  the  Temple  of  God,"  or  "  I  will  destroy  this  Temple  made  with 
hands,  and  in  three  days  will  build  another."  He  had  never  used 
these  expressions,  and  here  also  their  false  witness  was  so  self-contra- 
dictory as  to  break  down.  But  they  were  well  aware  that  this  attempt 
of  theirs  to  infuse  a  political  and  seditious  meaning  into  what  He  said, 
was  best  calculated  to  madden  the  tribunal  before  which  He  was 
arraigned :  indeed,  so  well  adapted  was  it  to  this  purpose  that  the 
mere  distant  echo,  as  it  were,  of  the  same  words  was  again  the  main 
cause  of  martyrdom  to  His  proto-martyr  Stephen. 

"  But  he  spake,"  says  St.  John,  "  of  the  temple  of  His  body,"  and 
he  adds  that  it  was  not  until  His  resurrection  that  His  disciples  fully 
understood  His  words.  Nor  is  this  astonishing,  for  they  were  words 
of  very  deep  significance.  Hitherto  there  had  been  but  one  Temple  of 
the  true  God,  the  Temple  in  which  He  then  stood — the  Temple  which 
symbolised,  and  had  once  at  least,  as  the  Jews  believed,  enshrined  that 
Shechinab,  or  cloud  of  glory,  which  was  the  living  witness  to  God's 
presence  in  the  world.  But  now  the  Spirit  of  God  abode  in  a  Temple 
not  made  with  hands,  even  in  the  sacred  Body  of  the  Son  of  God  made 
flesh.  He  tabernacled  among  us ;  "  He  had  a  tent  like  ours,  and  of  the 
same  material."  Even  this  was  to  be  done  away.  At  that  great 
Pentecost  three  years  later,  and  thenceforward  for  ever,  the  Holy 
Spirit  of  God  was  to  prefer 

"  Before  all  temples  tho  upright  heart  and  pure." 

Every  Christian  man  was  to  be,  in  his  mortal  body,  a  temple  of  tho 
Holy  Ghost.  This  was  to  be  the  central  truth,  the  sublimest  privilege 
of  the  New  Dispensation ;  this  was  to  be  the  object  of  Christ's  depar- 
ture, and  to  make  it  "  better  for  us  that  He  should  go  away." 


9'J  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

Nothing  could  have  been  more  amazing  to  the  carnal  mind,  that 
walked  by  sight  and  not  by  faith — nothing  more  offensive  to  the 
Pharisaic  mind  that  clung  to  the  material — than  this  high  truth,  that 
his  sacred  Temple  at  Jerusalem  was  henceforth  to  be  no  longer,  with 
any  special  privilege,  the  place  where  men  were  to  worship  the  Father ; 
that,  in  fact,  it  was  the  truest  Temple  no  longer.  Yet  they  might,  if 
they  had  willed  it,  have  had  some  faint  conception  of  what  Christ 
meant.  They  must  have  known  that  by  the  voice  of  John,  He  had 
been  proclaimed  the  Messiah  ;  they  might  have  realised  what  He  after- 
wards said  to  them,  that  "  in  this  place  was  one  greater  than  the 
Temple  ;  "  they  might  have  entered  into  the  remarkable  utterance  of 
a  Rabbi  of  their  own  class — an  utterance  involved  in  the  prophetic 
language  of  Daniel  ix.  24,  and  which  they  ought  therefore  to  have 
known — that  the  true  Holy  of  Holies  was  the  Messiah  Himself. 

And  in  point  of  fact  there  is  an  incidental  but  profoundly  signifi- 
cant indication  that  they  had  a  deeper  insight  into  Christ's  real 
meaning  than  they  chose  to  reveal.  For,  still  brooding  on  these  same 
words — the  first  official  words  which  Christ  had  addressed  to  them — 
when  Jesus  lay  dead  and  buried  in  the  rocky  tomb,  they  came  to 
Pilate  with  the  remarkable  story,  "  Sir,  we  remember  that  that 
deceiver  said,  while  He  was  yet  alive,  After  three  days  I  will  rise 
again."  Now  there  is  no  trace  that  Jesus  had  ever  used  any  such 
words  distinctly  to  them ;  and  unless  they  had  heard  the  saying  from 
Judas,  or  unless  it  had  been  repeated  by  common  rumour  derived 
from  the  Apostles — i.e.,  unless  the  "we  remember"  was  a  distinct 
falsehood — they  could  have  been  referring  to  no  other  occasion  than 
this.  And  that  they  should  have  heard  it  from  any  of  the  disciples 
was  most  unlikely ;  for  over  the  slow  hearts  of  the  Apostles  these 
words  of  our  Lord  seem  to  have  passed  like  the  idle  wind.  In  spite  of 
all  that  He  had  told  them,  there  seems  to  have  been  nothing  which 
they  expected  less  than  His  death,  unless  it  were  His  subsequent 
resurrection.  How  then  came  these  Pharisees  and  Priests  to  under- 
stand better  than  His  own  disciples  what  our  Lord  had  meant  ? 
Because  they  were  not  like  the  Apostles,  loving,  guileless,  simple- 
hearted  men ;  because,  in  spite  of  all  their  knowledge  and  insight, 
their  hearts  were  even  already  full  of  the  hatred  and  rejection  which 
ended  in  Christ's  murder,  and  which  drew  the  guilt  of  his  blood  on 
the  heads  of  them  and  of  their  children. 

But  there  was  yet  another  meaning  which  the  words  involved, 
not,  indeed,  less  distasteful  to  their  prejudices,  but  none  the  less  full 
of  warning,  and  more  clearly  within  the  range  of  their  understandings. 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  91 

The  Temple  was  the  very  heart  of  the  whole  Mosaic  system,  the  head- 
quarters, so  to  speak,  of  the  entire  Levitical  ceremonial.  In  profaning 
that  Temple,  and  suffering  it  to  be  profaned — in  suffering  One  whom 
they  chose  to  regard  as  only  a  poor  Galiloean  teacher  to  achieve  that 
purification  of  it  which,  whether  from  snpineness  or  from  self-interest, 
or  from  timidity,  neither  Caiaphas,  nor  Annas,  nor  Hillel,  nor 
Shammai,  nor  Gamaliel,  nor  Herod  had  ventured  to  attempt — were 
they  not,  as  it  were,  destroying  that  Temple,  abrogating  that  system, 
bearing  witness  by  their  very  actions  that  for  them  its  real  signifi- 
cance had  passed  away  ?  "  Finish,  then,"  he  might  have  implied,  at 
once  by  way  of  prophecy  and  of  permission,  "  finish  without  delay  this 
your  work  of  dissolution :  in  three  days  will  I,  as  a  risen  Redeemer, 
restore  something  better  and  greater ;  not  a  material  Temple,  but  a 
living  Church."  Such  is  the  meaning  which  St.  Stephen  seems  to 
have  seen  in  these  words.  Such  is  the  meaning  which  is  expanded  in 
so  many  passages  by  the  matchless  reasoning  and  passion  of  St.  Paul. 
But  to  this  and  every  meaning  they  were  deaf,  and  dull,  and  blind. 
They  seem  to  have  gone  away  silent  indeed,  but  sullen  and  dissatis- 
fied ;  suspicious  of,  yet  indifferent  to,  the  true  solution ;  ignorant,  yet 
too  haughty  and  too  angry  to  inquire. 

What  great  works  Jesus  did  on  this  occasion  we  cannot  tell. 
"Whatever  they  were,  they  caused  some  to  believe  on  Him ;  but  it 
was  not  as  yet  a  beliei  in  which  He  could  trust.  Their  mere  intel- 
lectual witness  to  His  claims  He  needed  not;  and  their  hearts, 
untouched  as  yet,  were,  as  He  knew  by  divine  insight,  cold  and 
barren,  treacherous  and  false. 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

NICODEMUS. 

A  CASTE  or  a  sect  may  consist  for  the  most  part  of  haughty  fanatics 
and  obstinate  bigots,  but  it  will  be  strange  indeed  if  there  are  to 
be  found  among  them  no  exceptions  to  the  general  characteristics ; 
strange  if  honesty,  candour,  sensibility,  are  utterly  dead  among  them 
all.  Even  among  rulers,  scribes,  Pharisees,  and  wealthy  members  of 
the  Sanhedrin,  Christ  found  believers  and  followers.  The  earliest 
and  most  remarkable  of  these  was  Nicodenms,  a  rich  man,  a  ruler,  a 
Pharisee,  and  a  member  of  the  Sanhedrin. 


92  THE   LIFE    OF   CHBIST. 

A  constitutional  timidity  is,  However,  observable  in  all  which  the 
Gospels  tell  us  about  Nicodemus ;  a  timidity  which  could  not  be 
wholly  overcome  even  by  his  honest  desire  to  befriend  and  acknow- 
ledge One  whom  he  knew  to  be  a  Prophet,  even  if  he  did  not  at 
once  recognise  in  Him  the  promised  Messiah.  Thus  the  few  words 
which  he  interposed  to  check  the  rash  injustice  of  his  colleagues  are 
cautiously  rested  on  a  general  principle,  and  betray  no  indication  of 
his  personal  faith  in  the  Galilcean  whom  his  sect  despised.  And  even 
when  the  power  of  Christ's  love,  manifested  on  the  cross,  had  made 
the  most  timid  disciples  bold,  Nicodemus  does  not  come  forward  with 
his  splendid  gifts  of  affection  until  the  example  had  been  set  by  one 
of  his  own  wealth,  and  rank,  and  station  in  society. 

Such  was  the  Rabbi  who,  with  that  mingled  candour  and  fear  of 
man  which  characterise  all  that  we  know  of  him,  came  indeed  to 
Jesus,  but  came  cautiously  by  night.  He  was  anxious  to  know  more 
of  this  young  Galilsean  prophet  whom  he  was  too  honest  not  to  recognise 
as  a  teacher  come  from  God ;  but  he  thought  himself  too  eminent  a 
person  among  his  sect  to  compromise  his  dignity,  and  possibly  even 
his  safety,  by  visiting  Him  in  public. 

Although  he  is  alluded  to  in  only  a  few  touches,  because  of  that 
high  teaching  which  Jesus  vouchsafed  to  him,  yet  the  impression  left 
upon  us  by  his  individuality  is  inimitably  distinct,  and  wholly  beyond 
the  range  of  invention.  His  very  first  remark  shows  the  indirect 
character  of  his  mind — his  way  of  suggesting  rather  than  stating  what 
he  wished — the  half-patronising  desire  to  ask,  yet  the  half -shrinking 
reluctance  to  frame  his  question — the  admission  that  Jesus  had  corae 
"from  God,"  yet  the  hesitating  implication  that  it  was  only  as  "a 
teacher,"  and  the  suppressed  inquiry,  "  What  must  I  do  ?" 

Our  Lord  saw  deep  into  his  heart,  and  avoiding  all  formalities  or 
discussion  of  preliminaries,  startles  him  at  once  with  the  solemn 
uncompromising  address,  "Verily,  verily,  I  say  unto  thee,  Except  a 
man  be  born  again  (or  '  from  above  '),  he  cannot  see  the  kingdom 
of  God."  My  disciple  must  be  mine  in  heart  and  soul,  or  he  is  no 
disciple  at  all ;  the  question  is  not  of  doing  or  not  doing,  but  of  being. 

That  answer  startled  Nicodemus  into  deep  earnestness ;  but  like  the 
Jews  in  the  last  chapter  (ii.  20),  he  either  could  not,  or  would  not,  grasp 
its  full  significance.  He  prefers  to  play,  with  a  kind  of  querulous  sur- 
prise, about  the  mere  literal  meaning  of  the  words  which  he  chooses  to 
interpret  in  the  most  physical  and  unintelligible  sense.  Mere  logomachy 
like  this  Jesus  did  not  pause  to  notice ;  Ho  only  sheds  a  fresh  ray  of 
light  on  the  reiteration  of  his  former  warning.  He  spoke,  not  of  the 


THE   LIFE   OP  CHEIST.  <J3 

fleshly  birth,  bat  of  that  spiritual  regeneration  of  which  no  man  could 
predict  the  course  or  method,  any  more  than  they  could  tell  the  course 
of  the  night  breeze  that  rose  and  fell  and  whispered  fitfully  outside  tho 
little  tabernacle  where  they  sat,  but  which  must  be  a  birth  by  water 
and  by  the  Spirit — a  purification,  that  is,  and  a  renewal — an  outward 
symbol  and  an  inward  grace — a  death  unto  sin  and  a  new  birth  unto 
righteousness. 

Nicodemus  could  only  answer  by  an  expression  of  incredulous 
amazement.  A  Gentile  might  need,  as  ifc  were,  a  new  birth  when 
admitted  into  the  Jewish  communion ;  but  he — a  son  of  Abraham,  a 
llabbi,  a  zealous  keeper  of  the  Law — could  lie  need  that  new  birth  ? 
How  could  such  things  be  ? 

"  Art  thou  the  teacher  (o  SiSacr/eoXo?)  of  Israel,"  asked  our  Lord, 
"and  knowest  not  these  things  ?  "  Art  thou  the  third  member  of  the  San- 
hedrin,  the  chdkdm  or  wiss  man,  and  yet  knowest  not  the  earliest,  simplest 
lesson  of  the  initiation  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven  ?  If  thy  knowledge 
be  thus  carnal,  thus  limited — if  thus  thou  stumblest  on  the  threshold, 
how  canst  thou.  understand  those  deeper  truths  which  He  only  who 
came  down  from  heaven  can  make  known  ?  The  question  was  half 
sorrowful,  half  reproachful ;  but  He  proceeded  to  reveal  to  this  Master 
in  Israel  things  greater  and  stranger  than  these;  even  the  salvation 
of  man  rendered  possible  by  the  sufferings  and  exaltation  of  the  Son 
of  Man ;  the  love  of  God  manifested  in  sending  His  only-begotten 
Son,  not  to  judge,  but  to  save ;  the  deliverance  for  all  through  faith  in 
Him ;  the  condemnation  which  must  fall  on  those  who  wilfully  reject 
the  truths  He  came  to  teach. 

These  were  indeed  the  mysteries  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven — truths 
once  undreamed  of,  but  now  fully  revealed.  And  although  they 
violated  every  prejudice,  and  overthrew  every  immediate  hope  of  this 
aged  inquirer — though  to  learn  them  he  must  unlearn  the  entire 
intellectual  habits  of  his  life  and  training — yet  we  know  from  tho 
sequel  that  they  must  have  sunk  into  his  inmost  soul.  Doubtless  in 
the  further  discussion  of  them  the  night  deepened  around  them ;  and 
in  the  memorable  words  about  the  light  and  the  darkness  with  which 
the  interview  was  closed,  Jesus  gently  rebuked  the  fear  of  man  which 
led  this  great  Rabbi  to  seek  the  shelter  of  midnight  for  a  deed  which 
was  not  a  deed  of  darkness  needing  to  be  concealed,  but  which  was 
indeed  a  coming  to  the  true  and  only  Light. 

Whatever  lessons  were  uttered,  or  signs  were  done  during  the 
remainder  of  this  First  Passover,  no  further  details  are  given  us  about 
them.  Finding  a  stolid  and  insensate  opposition,  our  Lord  left  Jeru- 


94  THE   LIFE    OF   CHBIST. 

salem,  and  went  with  His  disciples  "  into  Judaea,"  apparently  to  the 
banks  of  the  Jordan,  for  there  St.  John  tells  us  that  His  disciples 
began  to  baptise.  This  baptism,  a  distant  foreshadowing  of  the  future 
sacrament,  Christ  seems  rather  to  have  permitted  than  to  have  directly 
organised.  As  yet  it  was  the  time  of  Preparation ;  as  yet  the  inaugu- 
ration of  His  ministry  had  been,  if  we  may  be  allowed  the  expression. 
of  an  isolated  and  tentative  description.  Theologians  have  sought  for 
all  kinds  of  subtle  and  profound  explanations  of  this  baptism  by  the 
disciples.  Nothing,  however,  that  has  been  suggested  throws  any 
further  light  upon  the  subject,  and  we  can  only  believe  that  Jesus 
permitted  for  a  time  this  simple  and  beautiful  rite  as  a  sign  of 
discipleship,  and  as  the  national  symbol  of  a  desire  for  that  lustration 
of  the  heart  which  was  essential  to  all  who  would  enter  into  the  king- 
dom of  heaven. 

John  the  Baptist  was  still  continuing  his  baptism  of  repentance. 
Here,  too,  theologians  have  discovered  a  deep  and  mysterious  difficulty, 
and  have  entered  into  elaborate  disquisitions  on  the  relations  between 
the  baptism  of  Jesus  and  of  John.  Nothing,  however,  has  been  elicited 
from  the  discussion.  Inasmuch  as  the  full  activity  of  Christ's  ministry 
had  not  yet  been  begun,  the  baptism  of  St.  John  no  less  than  that  of 
the  disciples  must  be  still  regarded  as  a  symbol  of  repentance  and 
purity.  Nor  will  any  one  who  is  convinced  that  Repentance  is  "  the 
younger  brother  of  Innocence,"  and  that  for  all  who  have  sinned 
repentance  is  the  very  work  of  life,  be  surprised  that  the  earliest 
preaching  of  Jesus  as  of  John  was — "  Repent,  for  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  is  at  hand."  The  time  of  preparation,  of  preliminary  testing, 
was  not  over  yet ;  it  was  indeed  drawing  to  a  conclusion,  and  this 
baptism  by  the  disciples  was  but  a  transitory  phase  of  the  opening 
ministry.  And  the  fact  that  John  no  longer  preached  in  the  wilderness, 
or  baptised  at  Bethany,  but  had  found  it  desirable  to  leave  the  scene 
of  his  brief  triumph  and  glory,  marked  that  there  was  a  waning  in  the 
brightness  of  that  star  of  the  Gospel  dawn.  The  humble  spirit  of 
John — in  all  of  whose  words  a  deep  undertone  of  sadness  is  traceable — 
accepted,  in  entire  submissiveness  to  the  will  of  God,  the  destiny  of  a 
brief  and  interrupted  mission. 

He  had  removed  to  ^Enon,  near  Salim,  a  locality  so  wholly  uncer- 
tain that  it  is  impossible  to  arrive  at  any  decision  respecting  it.  Some 
still  came  to  his  baptism,  though  probably  in  diminished  numbers,  for 
a  larger  multitude  now  began  to  flock  to  the  baptism  of  Christ's 
disciples.  But  the  ignoble  jealousy  which  could  not  darken  the 
illuminated  soul  of  the  Forerunner,  found  a  ready  place  in  the  hearts 


TUB   LIFK    OF   CHRIST.  95 

of  his  followers.  How  long  it  may  have  smouldered  we  do  not  know, 
but  it  was  called  into  active  display  during  the  controversy  excited 
by  the  fact  that  two  great  Teachers,  of  whom  one  had  testified  to 
the  other  as  the  promised  Messiah,  were  baptising  large  multitudes 
of  people,  although  the  Sanhedrin  and  all  the  appointed  authorities 
of  the  nation  had  declared  against  their  claims.  Some  Jew  had 
annoyed  the  disciples  of  John  with  a  dispute  about  purification,  and 
they  vented  their  perplexed  and  mortified  feelings  in  a  complaint  to 
their  great  master :  "  Rabbi,  He  who  was  with  thee  beyond  Jordan, 
to  whom  thou  hast  borne  witness,  lo  He  is  baptising,  and  all  men 
are  coming  to  Him."  The  significant  suppression  of  the  name,  the 
tone  of  irritation  at  what  appeared  to  them  an  encroachment,  the 
scarcely  subdued  resentment  that  any  one  should  be  a  successful  rival 
to  him  whose  words  had  for  a  season  so  deeply  stirred  the  hearts  of 
men,  are  all  apparent  in  this  querulous  address.  And  in  the  noble 
answer  to  it,  all  John's  inherent  greatness  shone  forth.  He  could  not 
enter  into  rivalries,  which  would  be  a  treachery  against  his  deepest 
convictions,  a  falsification  of  his  most  solemn  words.  God  was  the 
sole  source  of  human  gifts,  and  in  His  sight  there  can  be  no  such 
thing  as  human  greatness.  He  reminded  them  of  his  asseveration  that 
he  was  not  the  Christ,  but  only  His  messenger ;  he  was  not  the  bride- 
groom, but  the  bridegroom's  friend,  and  his  heart  was  even  now  being 
gladdened  by  the  bridegroom's  voice.  Henceforth  he  was  content  to 
decrease ;  content  that  his  little  light  should  be  swallowed  up  in  the 
boundless  dawn.  He  was  but  an  earthly  messenger ;  but  he  had  put 
the  seal  of  his  most  intense  conviction  to  the  belief  that  God  was 
true,  and  had  given  all  things  to  His  Son,  and  that  through  Him 
alone  could  eternal  life  be  won. 


CHAPTER  XV. 

THE   WOMAN   OP  SAM1RIA. 


THE  Jew  whose  discussions  had  thus  deeply  moved  the  followers  of 
John  may  well  have  been  one  of  the  prominent  Pharisees ;  and  our 
Lord  soon  became  aware  that  they  were  watching  his  proceedings  with 
au  unfriendly  eye.  Their  hostility  to  John  was  a  still  deeper  hostility 


96  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

against  Him,  for  the  very  reason  that  His  teaching  wag  already  more 
successful.  Perhaps  in  consequence  of  this  determined  rejection  of  the 
earliest  steps  of  His  teaching — perhaps  also  out  of  regard  for  the 
wounded  feelings  of  John's  followers — but  most  of  all  because  at  this 
very  time  the  news  reached  Him  that  John  had  been  seized  by  Herod 
Antipas  and  thrown  into  prison — Jesus  left  Judaea  and  again  departed 
into  Galilee.  Being  already  in  the  north  of  Judaaa,  He  chose  the  route 
which  led  through  Samaria.  The  fanaticism  of  Jewish  hatred,  the 
fastidiousness  of  Jewish  Pharisaism,  which  led  His  countrymen  when 
travelling  alone  to  avoid  that  route,  could  have  no  existence  for  Him, 
and  were  things  rather  to  be  discouraged  than  approved. 

Starting  early  in  the  morning,  to  enjoy  as  many  as  possible  of  the 
cool  hours  for  travelling,  he  stopped  at  length  for  rest  and  refreshment 
in  the  neighbourhood  of  Sychar,  a  city  not  far  from  the  well  in  the 
fertile  district  which  the  partiality  of  the  patriarch  Jacob  had  bequeathed 
to  his  favourite  son.  The  well,  like  all  frequented  wells  in  the  East, 
was  doubtless  sheltered  by  a  little  alcove,  in  which  were  seats  of  stone. 

It  was  the  hour  of  noon,  and  weary  as  He  was  with  the  long 
journey,  possibly  also  with  the  extreme  heat,  our  Lord  sat  "  thus  "  on 
the  well.  The  expression  in  the  original  is  most  pathetically  pic- 
turesque. It  implies  that  the  Wayfarer  was  quite  tired  out,  and  in  His 
exhaustion  flung  His  limbs  wearily  on  the  seat,  anxious  if  possible  for 
complete  repose.  His  disciples — probably  the  two  pairs  of  brothers 
whom  he  had  called  among  the  earliest,  and  with  them  the  friends 
Philip  and  Bartholomew — had  left  him,  to  buy  in  the  neighbouring 
city  what  was  necessary  for  their  wants ;  and  hungry  and  thirsty,  He 
who  bore  all  our  infirmities  sat  wearily  awaiting  them,  when  His 
solitude  was  broken  by  the  approach  of  a  woman.  In  a  May  noon  in 
Palestine  the  heat  may  be  indeed  intense,  but  it  is  not  too  intense  to 
admit  of  moving  about ;  and  this  woman,  either  from  accident,  or, 
possibly,  because  she  was  in  no  good  repute,  and  therefore  would 
avoid  the  hour  when  the  well  would  be  thronged  by  all  the  women  of 
the  city,  was  coming  to  draw  water.  Her  national  enthusiasm,  and 
revcronco  for  the  great  ancestor  of  her  race,  or  perhaps  the  superior 
coolness  and  freshness  of  the  water,  may  have  been  sufficient  motive 
to  induce  her  to  seek  this  well,  rather  than  any  nearer  fountain. 
"VVat'jr  in  the  East  is  not  only  a  necessity,  but  a  delicious  luxury,  and 
the  natives  of  Palestine  are  connoisseurs  as  to  its  quality. 

Jesus  would  have  hailed  her  approach.  The  scene,  indeed,  in  that 
rich  green  valley,  with  the  great  cornfields  spreading  far  and  wide, 
and  the  grateful  shadow  of  trees,  and  the  rounded  masses  of  Ebal  and 


TIIE    LIFE    OF    CHEIST.  97 

Gemim  rising  on  either  hand,  might  well  have  invited  to  lonely  musing; 
and  all  the  associations  of  that  sacred  spot — the  story  of  Jacob,  the 
neighbouring  tomb  of  the  princely  Joseph,  the  memories  of  Joshua, 
and  of  Gideon,  and  the  long  line  of  Israelitish  kings — would  supply 
many  a  theme  for  such  meditations.  But  the  Lord  was  thirsty  and 
fatigued,  and  having  no  means  of  reaching  the  cool  water  which 
glimmered  deep  below  the  well's  mouth,  He  said  to  the  woman,  "  Givo 
me  to  drink." 

Every  one  who  has  travelled  in  the  East  knows  how  glad  and  ready 
is  the  response  to  this  request.  The  miserable  Fellah,  even  the  rough 
Bedawy,  seems  to  feel  a  positive  pleasure  in  having  it  in  his  power  to 
obey  the  command  of  his  great  prophet,  and  share  with  a  thirsty 
traveller  the  priceless  element.  But  so  deadly  was  the  hatred  and 
rivalry  between  Jews  and  Samaritans,  so  entire  the  absence  of  all 
familiar  intercourse  between  them,  that  the  request  only  elicited  from 
the  woman  of  Samaria  an  expression  of  surprise  that  it  should  havo 
been  made. 

Gently,  and  without  a  word  of  rebuke,  our  Lord  tells  her  that  had 
she  known  Him,  and  asked  of  Him,  He  would  have  given  her  living 
water.  She  pointed  to  the  well,  a  hundred  feet  deep.  He  had  nothing 
to  draw  with  :  whence  could  He  obtain  this  living  water  ?  And  then, 
perhaps  with  a  smile  of  incredulity  and  national  pride,  she  asked  if 
He  were  greater  than  their  father  Jacob,  who  had  digged  and  drunk 
of  that  very  well.  And  yet  there  must  have  been  something  which 
struck  and  overawed  her  in  His  words,  for  now  she  addresses  Him  by 
the  title  of  respect  which  had  been  wanting  in  her  first  address. 

Our  Lord  is  not  deterred  by  the  hard  literalism  of  her  reply; 
He  treats  it  as  He  had  treated  similar  unimaginative  dulness  in  the 
learned  Nicodemus,  by  still  drawing  her  thoughts  upward,  if  possible, 
to  a  higher  region.  She  was  thinking  of  common  water,  of  which  ho 
who  drinketh  would  thirst  again ;  but  the  water  He  spake  of  was  a 
fountain  within  the  heart,  which  quenched  all  thirst  for  ever,  and 
sprang  up  unto  eternal  life. 

She  becomes  the  suppliant  now.  He  had  asked  her  a  little  favour, 
which  she  had  delayed,  or  half  declined ;  he  now  offers  her  an  eternal 
gift.  She  sees  that  she  is  in  some  great  Presence,  and  begs  for  this 
living  water,  but  again  with  the  same  unspiritual  narrowness — sho 
only  begs  for  it  that  she  might  thirst  no  more,  nor  come  there  to  draw. 

But  enough  was  done  for  the  present  to  awake  and  to  instruct  this 
poor  stranger,  and  abruptly  breaking  off  this  part  of  the  conversation, 
Jesus  bids  her  call  her  husband  and  return.  All  that  was  in  His 


98  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

mind  when  He  uttered  this  command  we  cannot  tell ;  it  may  haye 
been  because  the  immemorial  decorum  of  the  East  regarded  it  as 
unbecoming,  if  not  as  positively  wrong,  for  any  man,  and  above  all  for 
a  Rabbi,  to  hold  conversation  with  a  strange  woman ;  it  may  have  been 
also  to  break  a  stony  heart,  to  awake  a  sleeping  conscience.  For  she 
was  forced  to  answer  that  she  had  no  husband,  and  our  Lord,  in  grave 
confirmation  of  her  sad  confession,  unbared  to  her  the  secret  of  a  loose 
and  wanton  life.  She  had  had  five  husbands,  "and  he  whom  she  now 
had  was  not  her  husband. 

She  saw  that  a  Prophet  was  before  her,  but  from  the  facts  of  her 
own  history — on  which  she  is  naturally  anxious  to  linger  as  little  as 
possible — her  eager  mind  flies  to  the  one  great  question  which  was 
daily  agitated  with  such  fierce  passion  between  her  race  and  that 
of  Him  to  whom  she  spake,  and  which  lay  at  the  root  of  the  savage 
animosity  with  which  they  treated  each  other.  Chance  had  thrown 
her  into  the  society  of  a  great  Teacher  :  was  it  not  a  good  opportunity 
to  settle  for  ever  the  immense  discussion  between  Jews  and  Samaritans 
as  to  whether  Jerusalem  or  Gerizim  was  the  holy  place  of  Palestine 
— Jerusalem,  where  Solomon  had  built  his  temple ;  or  Gerizim,  the 
immemorial  sanctuary,  where  Joshua  had  uttered  the  blessings, 
and  where  Abraham  had  been  ready  to  offer  up  his  son.  Pointing  to 
the  summit  of  the  mountain  towering  eight  hundred  feet  above  them, 
and  crowned  by  the  ruins  of  the  ancient  temple  of  Manasseh,  which 
Hyrcanus  had  destroyed,  she  put  her  dubious  question,  "  Our  fathers 
worshipped  in  this  mountain,  and  ye  say  that  Jerusalem  is  the  place 
where  men  ought  to  worship  ?  " 

Briefly,  and  merely  by  way  of  parenthesis,  He  resolved  her 
immediate  problem.  As  against  the  Samaritans,  the  Jews  were  tin- 
questionably  right.  Jerusalem  was  the  place  which  God  had  chosen  ; 
compared  to  the  hybrid  and  defective  worship  of  Samaria,  Judaism 
was  pure  and  true ;  but  before  and  after  touching  on  the  earthly  and 
temporal  controversy,  He  uttered  to  her  the  mighty  and  memorable 
prophecy,  that  the  hour  was  coming,  yea  now  was,  when  "  neither  in 
this  mountain  nor  yet  in  Jerusalem  "  should  true  worshippers  worship 
the  Father,  but  in  every  place  should  worship  Him  in  spirit  and  in  truth. 

She  was  deeply  moved  and  touched;  but  how  could  she,  at  the 
mere  chance  word  of  an  unknown  stranger,  give  up  the  strong  faith 
in  which  she  and  her  fathers  had  been  born  and  bred  ?  With  a  sigh 
sho  referred  the  final  settlement  of  this  and  of  every  question  to  the 
advent  of  the  Messiah ;  and  then  He  spake  the  simple,  awful  words — 
44 1  that  speak  unto  thee  am  Ho." 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  99 

His  birth  had  been  first  revealed  by  night  to  a  few  unknown  and 
ignorant  shepherds ;  the  first  fall,  clear  announcement  by  Himself  of 
His  own  Messiahship  was  made  by  a  well-side  in  the  weary  noon  to  a 
single  obscure  Samaritan  woman.  And  to  this  poor,  sinful,  ignorant 
stranger  had  been  uttered  words  of  immortal  significance,  to  which  all 
future  ages  would  listen,  as  it  were,  with  hushed  breath  and  on  their 
knees. 

Who  would  have  invented,  who  would  have  merely  imagined,  things 
so  unlike  the  thoughts  of  man  as  these  ? 

And  here  the  conversation  was  interrupted,  for  the  disciples — and 
among  them  he  who  writes  the  record — returned  to  their  Master. 
Jacob's  well  is  dug  on  elevated  ground,  on  a  spur  of  Gerizim,  and  in 
a  part  of  the  plain  unobstructed  and  unshaded  by  trees  or  buildings. 
From  a  distance  in  that  clear  air  they  had  seen  and  had  heard  their 
Master  in  long  and  earnest  conversation  with  a  solitary  figure.  He 
a  Jew,  He  a  Rabbi,  talking  to  "  a  woman,"  and  that  woman  a  Samari- 
tan, and  that  Samaritan  a  sinner !  Yet  they  dared  not  suggest 
anything  to  Him ;  they  dared  not  question  Him.  The  sense  of  His 
majesty,  the  love  and  the  faith  His  very  presence  breathed,  over- 
shadowed all  minor  doubts  or  wondering  curiosities. 

Meanwhile  the  woman,  forgetting  even  her  water-pot  in  her 
impetuous  amazement,  had  hurried  to  the  city  with  her  wondrous 
story.  Here  was  One  who  had  revealed  to  her  the  very  secrets  of 
her  life.  Was  not  this  the  Messiah  ? 

The  Samaritans — in  all  the  Gospel  notices  of  whom  we  detect 
something  simpler  and  more  open  to  conviction  than  in  the  Jews — 
instantly  flocked  out  of  the  city  at  her  words,  and  while  they  were 
seen  approaching,  the  disciples  urged  our  Lord  to  eat,  for  the  hour 
ef  noon  was  now  past,  and  He  had  had  a  weary  walk.  But  all  hunger 
had  been  satisfied  in  the  exaltation  of  His  ministry.  "I  have  food  to 
eat,"  He  said,  "which  ye  know  not."  Might  they  not  have  understood 
that,  from  childhood  upwards,  He  had  not  lived  by  bread  alone.?  But 
again  we  find  the  same  dull,  hard,  stolid  literalism.  Their  Scriptures, 
the  very  idiom  in  which  they  spoke,  were  full  of  vivid  metaphors,  yet 
they  could  hit  on  no  deeper  explanation  of  His  meaning  than  that 
perhaps  some  one  had  brought  Him  something  to  eat.  How  hard  must 
it  have  been  for  Him  thus,  at  every  turn,  to  find  even  in  His  chosen 
ones  such  a  strange  incapacity  to  see  that  material  images  were  but  the 
vehicles  for  deep  spiritual  thoughts.  But  there  was  no  impatience  in 
Him  who  was  meek  and  lowly  of  heart.  "My  meat,"  He  said,  " is  to 
do  the  will  of  Him  that  sent  me,  and  to  finish  His  work."  And  then 

n  2 


100  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

pointing  to  the  inhabitants  of  Sichem,  as  they  streamed  to  Him  over 
the  plain,  he  continued,  "  You  talk  of  there  yet  being  four  months  to 
harvest.  Look  at  these  fields,  white  already  for  the  spiritual  harvest. 
Ye  shall  be  the  joyful  reapers  of  the  harvest  which  I  thus  have  sown 
in  toil  and  pain ;  but  I,  the  sower,  rejoice  in  the  thought  of  that  joy 
to  come." 

The  personal  intercourse  with  Christ  convinced  many  of  these 
Samaritans  far  more  deeply  than  the  narrative  of  the  woman  to  whom 
He  had  first  revealed  Himself;  and  graciously  acceding  to  their 
request  that  He  would  stay  with  them,  He  and  His  disciples  abode 
there  two  days.  Doubtless  it  was  the  teaching  of  those  two  days  that 
had  a  vast  share  in  the  rich  conversions  of  a  few  subsequent  years. 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

EEJECTED    BY   THE    NAZA.RENES. 

UP  to  this  point  of  the  sacred  narrative  we  have  followed  the  chrono- 
logical guidance  of  St.  John,  and  here,  for  the  first  time,  we  are 
seriously  met  by  the  difficult  question  as  to  the  true  order  of  events 
in  our  Lord's  ministry. 

Is  it  or  is  it  not  possible  to  construct  a  harmony  of  the  Gospels 
which  shall  remove  all  the  difficulties  created  by  the  differing  order 
in  which  the  Evangelists  narrate  the  same  events,  and  by  the  con- 
fessedly fragmentary  character  of  their  records,  and  by  the  general 
vagueness  of  the  notes  of  time  which  they  give,  even  when  such  notes 
are  not  wholly  absent  ? 

It  is,  perhaps,  a  sufficient  answer  to  this  question  that  scarcely  any 
two  authorities  agree  in  the  schemes  which  have  been  elaborated  for 
the  purpose.  A  host  of  writers,  in  all  Christian  nations,  have  devoted 
years — some  of  them  have  devoted  well-nigh  their  whole  lives — to  the 
consideration  of  this  and  of  similar  questions,  and  have  yet  failed  to 
come  to  any  agreement  or  to  command  any  general  consent. 

To  enter  into  all  the  arguments,  on  both  sides,  about  the  numerous 
disputed  points  which  must  be  settled  before  the  problem  can  bo 
solved,  would  be  to  undertake  a  task  which  would  fill  many  volumes, 
would  produce  no  final  settlement  of  the  difficulty,  and  would  bo 
wholly  beyond  the  purpose  before  us.  What  I  have  done  is  carefully 


TDK    LIFE    OF   CHE  [ST.  101 

to  consider  the  chief  data,  and  without  entering  into  controversy  or 
pretending  to  remove  all  possible  objections,  to  narrate  the  events  in 
that  order  which,  after  repeated  study,  seems  to  be  the  most  in- 
trinsically probable,  with  due  reference  to  all  definite  indications  of 
time  which  the  Gospels  contain.  An  indisputable  or  convincing 
harmony  of  the  Gospels  appears  to  me  to  be  impossible,  and  as  a 
necessary  consequence  it  can  be  of  no  absolute  importance.  Had  it 
been  essential  to  our  comprehension  of  the  Saviour's  life  that  we 
should  know  more  exactly  the  times  and  places  where  the  years  of 
His  public  ministry  were  spent,  the  Christian  at  least  will  believe  that 
such  knowledge  would  not  have  been  withheld  from  us. 

The  inspiration  which  guided  the  Evangelists  in  narrating  the  life 
of  Christ  was  one  which  enabled  them  to  tell  all  that  was  necessary 
for  the  peace  and  well-being  of  our  souls,  but  very  far  from  all  which 
we  might  have  yearned  to  know  for  the  gratification  of  our  curiosity, 
or  even  the  satisfaction  of  our  historic  interest.  Nor  is  it  difficult  to 
see  herein  a  fresh  indication  that  our  thoughts  must  be  fixed  on  the 
spiritual  more  than  on  the  material — on  Christ  who  liveth  for  ever- 
more, and  is  with  us  always,  even  to  the  end  of  the  world,  far  more 
than  on  the  external  incidents  of  that  human  life  which,  in  the  council 
of  God's  will,  was  the  appointed  means  of  man's  redemption.  We 
shall  never  know  all  that  we  could  wish  to  know  about 

"  The  sinless  years 
That  breathed  beneath  tha  Syrian  blue," 

but  we  will  still  be  the  children  of  God  and  the  disciples  of  His  Christ 
if  we  keep  His  sayings  and  do  the  things  which  He  commanded. 

St.  John  tells  us  that  after  two  days'  abode  among  the  open-minded 
Samaritans  of  Sychar,  Jesus  went  into  Galilee,  "for  He  himself  testi- 
fied that  a  prophet  hath  no  honour  in  his  own  country,"  and  yet 
he  continues,  that,  "  When  he  was  come  into  Galilee,  the  Galilaeans 
received  him,  having  seen  all  the  things  that  He  did  at  Jerusalem  at 
the  feast ; "  and  he  adds,  immediately  afterwards,  that  Jesus  came 
again  into  Cana  of  Galilee,  and  there  healed  the  nobleman's  son.  The 
perplexing  "for"  seems  to  point  to  one  of  those  suppressed  trains  of 
thought  which  are  so  frequent  in  St.  John.  I  understand  it  to  mean 
that  at  Nazareth,  in  his  own  home,  rejection  awaited  Him  in  spite  of 
the  first  gleam  of  transient  acceptance ;  and  that  for  this  rejection  he 
was  not  unprepared,  for  it  was  one  of  His  distinct  statements  that  "in 
His  own  country  a  Prophet  is  dishonoured." 

It  was  not  the  object  of  St.  John  to  dwell  on  the  ministry  in  Galilee, 


102  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

which  had  been  already  narrated  by  the  Synoptists ;  accordingly  it  is 
from  St.  Luke  that  we  receive  the  fullest  account  of  our  Lord's  first 
public  act  in  His  native  town. 

It  appears  that  Jesus  did  not  go  direct  from  Sychar  to  Nazareth. 
On  His  way  (unless  we  take  Luke  iv.  15  for  a  general  and  nnchrono- 
logical  reference)  He  taught  continuously,  and  with  general  admiration 
and  acceptance,  in  the  synagogues  of  Galilee.  In  this  way  He  arrived 
at  Nazareth,  and  according  to  His  usual  custom,  for  He  had  doubtless 
been  a  silent  worshipper  in  that  humble  place  Sabbath  after  Sabbath 
from  boyhood  upwards,  He  entered  into  the  synagogue  on  the  Sabbath 
day. 

There  was  but  one  synagogue  in  the  little  town,  and  probably  it 
resembled  in  all  respects,  except  in  its  hnmbler  aspect  and  materials, 
the  synagogues  of  which  we  see  the  ruins  at  Tell  Hum  and  Irbid.  It 
was  simply  a  rectangular  hall,  with  a  pillared  portico  of  Grecian  archi- 
tecture, of  which  the  further  extremity  (where  the  "sanctuary"  was 
placed)  usually  pointed  towards  Jerusalem,  which,  since  the  time  of 
Solomon,  had  always  been  the  liibleh — i.e.,  the  consecrated  direction — 
of  a  Jew's  worship,  as  Mecca  is  of  a  Mohammedan's.  In  wealthier 
places  it  was  built  of  white  marble,  and  sculptured  on  the  outside  in 
alto-relievo,  with  rude  ornaments  of  vine-leaves  and  grapes,  or  the 
budding  rod  and  the  pot  of  manna.  On  entering  there  were  seats  on 
one  side  for  the  men ;  on  the  other,  behind  a  lattice,  were  seated  the 
women,  shrouded  in  their  long  veils.  At  one  end  was  the  tebhah  or 
ark  of  painted  wood,  which  contained  the  sacred  scriptures;  and  at 
one  side  was  the  Mma,  or  elevated  seat  for  the  reader  or  preacher. 
Clergy,  properly  speaking,  there  were  none,  but  in  the  chief  seats 
were  the  ten  or  more  batlamm,  "  men  of  leisure,"  or  leading  elders ; 
and  pre-eminent  among  these  the  chief  of  the  synagogue,  or  rosli 
haJc-Tceneseth.  Inferior  in  rank  to  these  were  the  chazzdn,  or  clerk, 
whose  duty  it  was  to  keep  the  sacred  books  ;  the  sheUach,  correspond- 
ing to  our  sacristan  or  verger ;  and  the  parnasim,  or  shepherds,  who 
in  some  respects  acted  as  deacons. 

The  service  of  the  synagogue  was  not  unlike  our  own.  After  the 
prayers  two  lessons  were  always  read,  one  from  the  Law  called 
parashah,  and  one  from  the  Prophets  called  haphtwah ;  and  as  there 
were  no  ordained  ministers  to  conduct  the  services — for  the  office  of 
priests  and  Levitcs  at  Jerusalem  was  wholly  different — these  lessons 
might  not  only  bo  read  by  any  competent  person  who  received  per- 
mission from  the  rosh  hak-kencseth,  but  he  was  oven  at  liberty  to  add 
his  own  midrash,  or  comment. 


TIIE   LIFE    OF   CHBIST.  103 

The  reading  of  the  parashah,  or  lesson  from  the  Pentateuch,  was 
apparently  over  when  Jesus  ascended  the  steps  of  the  bima.  Recog- 
nising His  claim  to  perform  the  honourable  function  of  a  maphtir  or 
reader,  the  cliazzdn  drew  aside  the  silk  curtain  of  the  painted  ark 
which  contained  the  sacred  manuscripts,  and  handed  Him  the  megillah 
or  roll  of  the  Prophet  Isaiah,  which  contained  the  Jiaplitarah  of  the 
day.  Our  Lord  unrolled  the  volume,  and  found  the  well-known 
passage  in  Isaiah  Ixi.  The  whole  congregation  stood  up  to  listen  to 
Him.  The  length  of  the  haphtarah  might  be  from  three  to  twenty-one 
verses ;  but  Jesus  only  read  the  first  and  part  of  the  second,  stopping 
short,  in  a  spirit  of  tenderness,  before  the  stern  expression,  "  The  day 
of  vengeance  of  our  Grod,"  so  that  the  gracious  words,  "The  acceptable 
year  of  the  Lord,"  might  rest  last  upon  their  ears  and  form  the  text  of 
His  discourse.  He  then  rolled  up  the  megillah,  handed  it  back  to  the 
cliazzdn,  and,  as  was  customary  among  the  Jews,  sat  down  to  deliver 
Hia  sermon. 

The  passage  which  He  had  read,  whether  part  of  the  ordinary 
lesson  for  the  day  or  chosen  by  Himself,  was  a  very  remarkable  one, 
and  it  must  have  derived  additional  grandeur  and  solemnity  from  the 
lips  of  Him  in  whom  it  was  fulfilled.  Every  eye  in  the  synagogue  was 
fixed  upon  Him  with  a  gaze  of  intense  earnestness,  and  we  may  imagine 
the  thrill  of  awful  expectation  and  excitement  which  passed  through 
the  hearts  of  the  listeners,  as,  in  a  discourse  of  which  the  subject  only 
is  preserved  for  us  by  the  Evangelist,  He  developed  the  theme  that  He 
was  Himself  the  Messiah,  of  whom  the  great  Prophet  had  sung  700 
years  before.  His  words  were  full  of  a  grace,  an  authority,  a  power 
which  was  at  first  irresistible,  and  which  commanded  the  involuntary 
astonishment  of  all.  But  as  He  proceeded  He  became  conscious  of  a 
change.  The  spell  of  his  wisdom  and  sweetness  was  broken,  as  these 
rude  and  violent  Nazarenes  began  to  realise  the  full  meaning  of  His 
divine  claims.  It  was  customary  with  the  Jews  in  the  worship  of 
their  synagogue  to  give  full  vent  to  their  feelings,  and  it  was  not  long 
before  Jesus  became  sensible  of  indignant  and  rebellious  murmurs.  He 
saw  that  those  eager  glittering  eyes,  which  had  been  fixed  upon  Him 
in  the  first  excitement  of  attention,  were  beginning  to  glow  with  the 
malignant  light  of  jealousy  and  hatred.  "  Is  not  this  the  carpenter  ?  is 
He  not  the  brother  of  workmen  like  himself — James  and  Joses  and 
Simon  and  Judas — and  of  sisters  who  live  among  us  ?  do  not  even  his 
own  family  disbelieve  in  him  ? "  Such  were  the  whispers  which 
began  to  bo  buzzed  about  among  the  audience.  This  was  no  young 
and  learned  Rabbi  from  the  schools  of  Gamaliel  or  Shammai,  and  yet 


104  THE   LIFE    OF   CHK1ST. 

he  spoke  with  an  authority  -which  not  even  the  great  scribes  assumed  ! 
Even  a  Hillel,  when  his  doctrines  failed  to  persuade,  could  only  secure 
conviction  by  appealing  to  the  previous  authority  of  a  Shemaia  or  an 
Abtalion.  But  this  teacher  appealed  to  no  one — this  teacher  who  had 
but  been  their  village  carpenter !  What  business  had  he  to  teach  ? 
Whence  could  he  know  letters,  having  never  learned  ? 

Jesus  did  not  leave  unobserved  the  change  which  was  passing  over 
the  feslings  of  His  audience.  He  at  once  told  them  that  He  was  the 
Jesus  whom  they  described,  and  yet  with  no  abatement  of  His  Messianic 
grandeur.  Their  hardness  and  unbelief  had  already  depressed  His 
spirit  before  He  had  even  entered  the  synagogue.  The  implied  slur 
on  the  humility  of  His  previous  life  He  passes  by ;  it  was  too  essen- 
tially provincial  and  innately  vulgar  to  need  correction,  since  any 
Nazarene  of  sufficient  honesty  might  have  reminded  himself  of  the 
yet  humbler  origin  of  the  great  herdsman  Amos.  Nor  would  He 
notice  the  base  hatred  which  weak  and  bad  men  always  contract  for 
those  who  shame  them  by  the  silent  superiority  of  noble  lives.  Bat 
He  was  aware  of  another  feeling  in  their  minds ;  a  demand  upon  Him 
for  some  stupendous  vindication  of  his  claims ;  a  jealousy  that  He 
should  have  performed  miracles  at  Cana,  and  given  an  impression  of 
His  power  at  Capernaum,  to  say  nothing  of  what  He  had  done  and 
taught  at  Jerusalem — and  yet  that  He  should  have  vouchsafed  no 
special  mark  of  His  favour  among  them.  He  knew  that  the  taunting 
and  sceptical  proverb,  "  Physician,  heal  thyself,"  was  in  their  hearts, 
and  all  but  on  their  lips.  But  to  show  them  most  clearly  that  He 
was  something  more  than  they — that  He  was  no  mere  Nazarene,  like 
any  other  who  might  have  lived  among  them  for  thirty  years,  and 
that  He  belonged  not  to  them  but  to  the  world — He  reminds  them 
that  miracles  are  not  to  be  limited  by  geographical  relationships — that 
Elijah  had  only  saved  the  Phoenician  widow  of  Sarepta,  and  Elisha 
only  healed  the  hostile  leper  of  Syria. 

Wliat  then  ?  were  they  in  His  estimation  (and  He  but  the  "  car- 
penter !  ")  no  better  than  Gentiles  and  lepers  ?  This  was  the  climax 
of  all  that  was  intolerable  to  them,  as  coming  from  a  fellow-townsman 
whom  they  wished  to  rank  among  themselves ;  and  at  these  words 
their  long- suppressed  fury  burst  into  a  flame.  The  speaker  was  no 
longer  interrupted  by  a  murmur  of  disapprobation,  but  by  a  roar  of 
wrath.  With  one  of  those  bursts  of  sanguinary  excitement  which 
characterised  that  strange,  violent,  impassioned  people — a  people 
whose  minds  are  swept  by  storms  as  sudden  as  those  which  in  one 
moment  lash  into  fury  the  mirror  surface  of  their  lake — they  rose  in 


THE   LIFE    OP   CHRIST.  105 

a  body,  tore  Him  out  of  the  city,  and  then  dragged  Him  to  the  brow 
of  the  hill  above.  The  little  town  of  Nazareth  nestles  in  the  southern 
hollows  of  that  hill ;  many  a  mass  of  precipitous  rock  lies  imbedded 
on  its  slopes,  and  it  is  probable  that  the  hill-side  may  have  been  far 
more  steep  and  precipitous  two  thousand  years  ago.  To  one  of  these 
rocky  escarpments  they  dragged  Him,  in  order  to  fling  Him  headlong 
down. 

But  His  hour  was  not  yet  come,  and  they  were  saved  from  the 
consummation  of  a  crime  which  would  have  branded  them  with  ever- 
lasting infamy.  "  He  passed  through  the  midst  of  them,  and  went  on 
his  way."  There  is  no  need  to  suppose  an  actual  miracle ;  still  less  to 
imagine  a  secret  and  sudden  escape  into  the  narrow  and  tortuous  lanes 
of  the  town.  Perhaps  His  silence,  perhaps  the  calm  nobleness  of  His 
bearing,  perhaps  the  dauntless  innocence  of  His  gaze  overawed  them. 
Apart  from  anything  supernatural,  there  seems  to  have  been  in  the 
presence  of  Jesus  a  spell  of  mystery  and  of  majesty  which  even  His 
most  ruthless  and  hardened  enemies  acknowledged,  and  before  which 
they  involuntarily  bowed.  It  was  to  this  that  He  owed  His  escape 
when  the  maddened  Jews  in  the  Temple  took  up  stones  to  stone  Him  ; 
it  was  this  that  made  the  bold  and  bigoted  officers  of  the  Sanhedrin 
unable  to  arrest  Him  as  He  taught  in  public  during  the  Feast  of 
Tabernacles  at  Jerusalem ;  it  was  this  that  made  the  armed  band  of 
His  enemies,  at  His  mere  look,  fall  before  Him  to  the  ground  in  the 
Garden  of  Gethsemane.  Suddenly,  quietly  He  asserted  His  freedom, 
waived  aside  his  captors,  and  overawing  them  by  His  simple  glance, 
passed  through  their  midst  unharmed.  Similar  events  have  occurred 
iu  history,  and  continue  still  to  occur.  There  is  something  in  defence- 
less and  yet  dauntless  dignity  that  calms  even  the  fury  of  a  mob. 
"  They  stood — stopped — inquired — were  ashamed — fled — separated." 

And  so  He  left  them,  never  apparently  to  return  again ;  never,  if 
we  are  right  in  the  view  here  taken,  to  preach  again  in  their  little 
synagogue.  Did  any  feelings  of  merely  human  regret  weigh  down 
His  soul  while  He  was  wending  His  weary  steps  down  the  steep  hill- 
slope  towards  Cana  of  Galilee  ?  Did  any  tear  start  in  His  eyes  un- 
bidden as  he  stood,  perhaps  for  the  last  time,  to  gaze  from  thence  on 
the  rich  plain  of  Esdraelon,  and  the  purple  heights  of  Carmel,  and  the 
white  sands  that  fringe  the  blue  waters  of  the  Mediterranean  ?  Were 
there  any  from  whom  He  grieved  to  be  severed,  in  the  green  secluded 
valley  where  His  manhood  had  laboured,  and  His  childhood  played  ? 
Did  He  cast  one  longing,  lingering  glance  at  the  humble  home  in 
which  for  BO  many  years  He  had  toiled  as  the  village  carpenter  ?  Did 


106  THE   LIFE   OP  CHE1ST. 

no  companion  of  His  innocent  boyhood,  no  friend  of  His  sinless  youth, 
accompany  Him  with  awe,  and  pity,  and  regret  ?  Such  questions  are 
not,  surely,  unnatural ;  not,  surely,  irreverent ; — but  they  are  not 
answered.  Of  all  merely  human  emotions  of  His  heart,  except  so  far 
as  they  directly  affect  His  mission  upon  earth,  the  Gospels  are  silent. 
We  know  only  that  henceforth  other  friends  awaited  him  away  from 
boorish  Nazareth,  among  the  gentle  and  noble-hearted  fishermen  of 
Bethsaida ;  and  that  thenceforth  His  home,  so  far  as  He  had  a  home 
was  in  the  little  city  of  Capernaum,  beside  the  sunlit  waters  of  the 
Galilasan  Lake. 


CHAPTER  XVII. 

THE   BEGINNING   OP  THE   GALILEAN  MINISTRY. 

REJECTED  of  Nazareth,  our  Lord  naturally  turned  to  the  neighbouring 
Cana,  where  His  first  miracle  had  been  wrought  to  gladden  friends.  He 
had  not  long  arrived  when  an  officer  from  the  neighbouring  court  of 
Herod  Antipas,  hearing  of  His  arrival,  came  and  urgently  entreated 
that  He  would  descend  to  Capernaum  and  heal  his  dying  son. 
Although  our  Lord  never  set  foot  in  Tiberias,  yet  the  voice  of  John 
had  more  than  once  been  listened  to  with  alarm  and  reverence  in  the 
court  of  the  voluptuous  king.  We  know  that  Manaen,  the  foster- 
brother  of  Herod,  was  in  after  days  a  Christian,  and  we  know  that 
among  the  women  who  ministered  to  Christ  of  their  substance  was 
Joanna,  the  wife  of  Chuza,  Herod's  steward.  As  this  courtier 
(BocrtXt/co?)  believed  in  Christ  with  his  whole  house,  in  consequence 
of  the  miracle  now  wrought,  it  has  been  conjectured  with  some 
probability  that  it  was  none  other  than  Chuza  himself. 

The  imperious  urgency  of  his  request,  a  request  which  appears  at 
first  to  have  had  but  little  root  in  spiritual  conviction,  needed  a  momen- 
tary check.  It  was  necessary  for  Jesus  to  show  that  He  was  no 
mere  haJceem,  no  mere  benevolent  physician,  ready  at  any  time  to  work 
local  cures,  and  to  place  His  supernatural  powers  at  the  beck  and  call 
of  any  sufferer  who  might  come  to  Him  as  a  desperate  resource.  He 
at  once  rebuked  the  spirit  which  demanded  mere  signs  and  prodigies 
as  the  sole  possible  ground  of  faith.  But  yielding  to  the  father's 
passionate  earnestness,  He  dismissed  him  with  the  assurance  that  his 


THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  107 

son  lived.  The  interview  had  taken  place  at  the  seventh  hour — i.e.,  at 
one  o'clock  in  the  day.  Even  in  the  short  November  day  it  would 
have  been  still  possible  for  the  father  to  get  to  Capernaum;  for  if 
Cana  be,  as  we  believe,  Kefr  Kenna,  it  is  not  more  than  five  hours' 
distance  from  Capernaum.  Bat  the  father's  soul  had  been  calmed  by 
faith  in  Christ's  promise,  and  he  slept  that  night  at  some  intermediate 
spot  upon  the  road.  The  next  day  his  slaves  met  him,  and  told  him 
that,  at  the  very  hour  when  Jesus  had  spoken,  the  fever  had  left  his 
son.  This  was  the  second  time  that  Christ  had  signalised  His  arrival 
in  Galilee  by  the  performance  of  a  conspicuous  miracle.  The  position 
of  the  courtier  caused  it  to  be  widely  known,  and  it  contributed,  no 
doubt,  to  that  joyous  and  enthusiastic  welcome  which  our  Lord  received 
during  that  bright  early  period  of  His  ministry,  which  has  been  beauti- 
fully called  the  "  Galilean  spring." 

At  this  point  we  are  again  met  by  difficulties  in  the  chronology, 
which  are  not  only  serious,  but  to  the  certain  solution  of  which  there 
appears  to  be  no  clue.  If  we  follow  exclusively  the  order  given  by  one 
Evangelist,  we  appear  to  run  counter  to  the  scattered  indications  which 
may  be  found  in  another.  That  it  should  be  so  will  cause  no  difficulty 
to  the  candid  mind.  The  Evangelists  do  not  profess  to  be  scrupulously 
guided  by  chronological  sequence.  The  pictures  which  they  give  of 
the  main  events  in  the  life  of  Christ  are  simple  and  harmonious,  and 
that  they  should  be  presented  in  an  informal,  and  what,  with  reference 
to  mere  literary  considerations,  would  be  called  inartistic  manner,  is 
not  only  in  accordance  with  the  position  of  the  writers,  but  is  an 
additional  confirmation  of  our  conviction  that  we  are  reading  the 
records  of  a  life  which,  in  its  majesty  and  beauty,  infinitely  transcended 
the  capacities  of  invention  or  imagination  in  the  simple  and  faithful 
annalists  by  whom  it  was  recorded. 

It  was  not,  as  we  have  already  observed,  the  object  of  St.  John  to 
narrate  the  Galilsean  ministry,  the  existence  of  which  he  distinctly 
implies  (vii.  3,  4),  but  which  had  already  been  fully  recorded.  Cir- 
cumstances had  given  to  the  Evangelist  a  minute  and  profound  know- 
ledge of  the  ministry  in  Judaea,  which  is  by  the  others  presupposed, 
though  not  narrated.  At  this  point  accordingly  (iv.  54)  he  breaks  off, 
and  only  continues  the  thread  of  his  narrative  at  the  return  of  Jesus 
to  "a"  or  "the"  feast  of  the  Jews  (v.  1).  If  the  feast  here  alluded 
to  were  the  feast  of  Purim,  as  we  shall  see  ia  probably  the  case,  then 
St.  John  here  passes  over  the  history  of  several  months.  We  fall  back, 
therefore,  on  the  Synoptic  Gospels  for  the  events  of  the  intervening 
ministry  on  the  shores  of  Gennesareth.  And  since  we  have  often  to 


108  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

choose  between  the  order  of  events  as  narrated  by  the  three  Evan- 
gelists, we  must  here  follow  that  given  by  St.  Luke,  both  because  it 
appears  to  ns  intrinsically  probable,  and  because  St.  Luke,  unlike  the 
two  previous  Evangelists,  seems  to  have  been  guided,  so  far  as  his 
information  allowed,  by  chronological  considerations. 

It  seems  then,  that  after  leaving  Cana,  our  Lord  went  at  once  to 
Capernaum,  accompanied  apparently  by  His  mother  and  His  brethren, 
and  made  that  town  His  home.  His  sisters  were  probably  married, 
and  did  not  leave  their  native  Nazareth  ;  but  the  dreadful  insult  which 
Jesus  had  received  would  have  been  alone  sufficient  to  influence  His 
family  to  leave  the  place,  even  if  they  did  not  directly  share  in  the 
odium  and  persecution  which  His  words  had  caused.  Perhaps  the 
growing  alienation  between  Himself  and  them  may  have  been  due,  in 
part  to  this  circumstance.  They  must  have  felt,  and  we  know  that 
they  did  feel,  a  deeply-seated  annoyance,  if,  refusing  to  admit  the  full 
awfulness  of  His  mission,  and  entirely  disapproving  the  form  of  its 
manifestation,  they  yet  felt  themselves  involved  in  hatred  and  ruin  as  a 
direct  consequence  of  His  actions.  Certain  it  is  that,  although  ap- 
parently they  were  living  at  Capernaum,  their  home  was  not  His  home. 
Home,  in  the  strict  sense,  He  had  none ;  but  the  house  of  which  He 
made  ordinary  use  appears  to  have  been  that  which  belonged  to  His 
chief  apostle.  It  is  true  that  Simon  and  Andrew  are  said  to  have 
belonged  to  Bethsaida,  but  they  may  easily  have  engaged  the  use  of  a 
house  at  Capernaum,  belonging  to  Peter's  mother-in-law;  or,  since 
Bethsaida  is  little  more  than  a  suburb  or  part  of  Capernaum,  they  may 
have  actually  moved  for  the  convenience  of  their  Master  from  the  one 
place  to  the  other. 

The  first  three  Evangelists  have  given  us  a  detailed  account  of  the 
Lord's  first  Sabbath  at  Capernaum,  and  it  has  for  us  an  intrinsic 
interest,  because  it  gives  us  one  remarkable  specimen  of  the  manner  in 
which  He  spent  the  days  of  His  active  ministry.  It  is  the  best  com- 
mentary on  that  epitome  of  His  life  which  presents  it  to  us  in  its  most 
splendid  originality — that  "He  went  about  doing  good."  It  is  the 
point  which  the  rarest  and  noblest  of  His  followers  have  found  it 
most  difficult  to  imitate ;  it  is  the  point  in  which  His  life  transcended 
most  absolutely  the  ideal  of  the  attainments  of  His  very  greatest 
forerunners.  The  seclusion  of  the  hermit,  the  self-maceration  of  the 
ascetic,  the  rapture  of  the  mystic — all  these  are  easier  and  more 
common  than  the  unwearied  toil  of  a  self-renouncing  love. 

The  day  began  in  the  synagogue,  perhaps  in  the  very  building 
•which  the  Jews  owed  to  the  munificence  of  the  centurion  proselyte. 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  109 

If  Capernaum  were  indeed  Tell  Hum,  then  the  white  marble  ruins 
which  still  stand  on  a  little  eminence  above  the  sparkling  lake,  and 
still  encumber  the  now  waste  and  desolate  site  of  the  town  with  their 
fragments  of  elaborate  sculpture,  may  possibly  be  the  ruins  of  this 
very  building.  The  synagogue,  which  is  not  very  large,  must  have 
been  densely  crowded ;  and  to  teach  an  earnest  and  expectant  crowd — 
to  teach  as  He  taught,  not  in  dull,  dead,  conventional  formulae,  but 
with  thoughts  that  breathed  and  words  that  burned — to  teach  as  they 
do  who  are  swayed  by  the  emotion  of  the  hour,  while  heart  speaks  to 
heart — must  have  required  no  slight  energy  of  life,  must  have  involved 
no  little  exhaustion  of  the  physical  powers.  But  this  was  not  all. 
While  Ho  was  speaking,  while  the  audience  of  simple-hearted  yet 
faithful,  intelligent,  warlike  people  were  listening  to  Him  in  mute 
astonishment,  hanging  on  His  lips  with  deep  and  reverential  admira- 
tion— suddenly  the  deep  silence  was  broken  by  the  wild  cries  and 
obscene  ravings  of  one  of  those  unhappy  wretches  who  were  univer- 
sally believed  to  be  under  the  influence  of  impure  spirits,  and  who — 
in  the  absence  of  any  retreat  for  such  sufferers — had,  perhaps,  slipped 
in  unobserved  among  the  throng.  Even  the  poor  demoniac,  in  the 
depths  of  his  perturbed  and  degraded  nature,  had  felt  the  haunting 
spell  of  that  pure  presence,  of  that  holy  voice,  of  that  divine  and 
illuminating  message.  But,  distorted  as  his  whole  moral  being  was, 
ho  raved  against  it,  as  though  by  the  voices  of  the  evil  demons  who 
possessed  him,  and  while  he  saluted  "  Jesus  the  Nazarene "  as  the 
Holy  One  of  God,  yet,  with  agonies  of  terror  and  hatred,  demanded 
to  be  let  alone,  and  not  to  be  destroyed. 

Then  followed  a  scene  of  thrilling  excitement.  Turning  to  the 
furious  and  raving  sufferer,  recognising  the  duality  of  his  conscious- 
ness, addressing  the  devil  which  seemed  to  be  forcing  from  him  these 
terrified  ejaculations,  Jesus  said,  "  Hold  thy  peace,  and  come  out  of 
him."  He  never  accepted  or  tolerated  this  ghastly  testimony  to  His 
origin  and  office.  The  calm,  the  sweetness,  the  power  of  the  divine 
utterance  were  irresistible.  The  demoniac  fell  to  the  ground  in  a 
fearful  paroxysm,  screaming  and  convulsed.  But  it  was  soon  over. 
The  man  arose  cured ;  his  whole  look  and  bearing  showed  that  he  was 
dispossessed  of  the  over-mastering  influence,  and  was  now  in  his  right 
mind.  A  miracle  so  gracious  and  so  commanding  had  never  before 
been  so  strikingly  manifested,  and  the  worshippers  separated  with 
emotions  of  indescribable  wonder. 

Rising  from  the  seat  of  the  maphtir  in  the  synagogue,  Christ 
retired  into  the  house  of  Simon.  Here  again  he  was  met  by  the 


110  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

strong  appeal  of  sickness  and  suffering.  Simon,  whom  he  had  already 
bound  to  Himself  on  the  banks  of  the  Jordan,  by  the  first  vague  call 
to  his  future  Apostolate,  was  a  married  man,  and  his  wife's  mother 
lay  stricken  down  by  a  violent  access  of  fever.  One  request  from  the 
afflicted  family  was  sufficient :  there  was  no  need,  as  in  the  case  of  the 
more  worldly  nobleman,  for  importunate  entreaty.  He  stood  over 
her ;  He  took  her  by  the  hand ;  He  raised  her  up ;  He  rebuked  the 
fever ;  His  voice,  stirring  her  whole  being,  dominated  over  the  sources 
of  disease,  and,  restored  instantaneously  to  health,  she  rose  and  busied 
herself  about  the  household  duties. 

Possibly  the  strictness  of  observance  which  marked  the  Jewish 
Sabbath  secured  for  our  Lord  a  brief  interval  for  refreshment ;  but  no 
sooner  did  the  sun  begin  to  set,  than  the  eager  multitude,  barely 
waiting  for  the  full  close  of  the  Sabbath  hours,  began  to  seek  His 
aid.  The  whole  city  came  densely  thronging  round  the  doors  of  the 
humble  home,  bringing  with  them  their  demoniacs  and  their  diseased. 
What  a  strange  scene !  There  lay  the  limpid  lake,  reflecting  in  pale 
rose-colour  the  last  flush  of  sunset  that  gilded  the  western  hills ;  and 
here,  amid  the  peace  of  Nature,  was  exposed,  in  hideous  variety,  the 
sickness  and  misery  of  man,  while  the  stillness  of  the  Sabbath  twilight 
was  broken  by  the  shrieks  of  demoniacs  who  testified  to  the  Pre- 
sence of  the  Son  of  God. 

"  A  lazar-house  it  seemed,  wherein  were  laid 

Numbers  of  all  diseased ;  all  maladies 

Of  ghastly  spasm,  and  racking  tortures,  qualms 

Of  heart-sick  agony,  all  feverous  kinds, 

Demoniac  phrenzy,  moping  melancholy 

And  moonstruck  madness  j " 

and  amidst  them  all,  not 

"  Despair 

Tended  the  sick,  busiest  from  couch  to  couch, 
And  over  them  triumphant  Death  his  dart 
Shook,"    .... 

but  far  into  the  deepening  dusk,  the  only  person  there  who  was 
unexcited  and  unalarmed — hushing  by  His  voice  the  delirium  of 
madness  and  the  screams  of  epilepsy,  touching  disease  into  health 
again  by  laying  on  each  unhappy  and  tortured  sufferer  His  pure  and 
gentle  hands — moved,  in  His  love  and  tenderness,  the  young  Prophet 
of  Nazareth,  the  Christ,  the  Saviour  of  the  world.  Unalarmed  indeed, 
and  unexcited,  but  not  free  from  sorrow  and  suffering.  For  sympathy 
is  nothing  else  than  a  fellow-feeling  with  others  :  a  sensible  participa- 
tion in  their  joy  or  woe.  And  Jesus  was  touched  with  a  feeling  of 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  Ill 

their  infirmities.  Those  cries  pierced  to  His  inmost  heart ;  the  groans 
and  sighs  of  all  that  collective  misery  filled  His  whole  soul  \vith  pity 
He  bled  for  them ;  He  suffered  -with  them ;  their  agonies  were  His  ; 
so  that  the  Evangelist  St.  Matthew  recalls  and  echoes  in  this  place, 
with  a  slight  difference  of  language,  the  words  of  Isaiah,  "  Surely  He 
bore  our  griefs  and  carried  our  sorrows." 

The  fame  of  that  marvellous  day  rang  through  all  Galilee  and 
Pereea,  and  even  to  the  farthest  parts  of  Syria ;  and  we  might  well 
have  imagined  that  the  wearied  Saviour  would  have  needed  a  long 
repose.     Bat  to  Him  the  dearest  and  best  repose  was  solitude  and 
silence,  where  He  might  be  alone  and  undisturbed  with  His  heavenly 
Father.     The  little  plain  of  Gennesareth  was  still  covered  with  the 
deep  darkness  which  precedes  the  dawn,  when,  unobserved  by  all, 
Jesus  rose  and  went  away  to  a  desert  place,  and  there  refreshed  His 
spirit  with  quiet  prayer.     Although  the  work  which  He  was  sent  to 
do  obliged  Him  often  to  spend  His  days  amid  thronging  and  excited 
multitudes,  He  did  not  love  the  tumult,  and  avoided  even  the  admira- 
tion and  gratitude  of  those  who  felt  in  His  presence  a  spring  of  life. 
But  He  was  not  suffered  thus  to  remain,  even  for  a  brief  period,  in 
rest  and  seclusion.     The  multitude  sought  Him  persistently;  Simon 
and  his  friends  almost  hunted  for  Him  in  their  eager  desire  to  see  and 
to  hear.      They  even  wished  to  detain  Him  among  them  by  gentle 
force.     But  He  quietly  resisted  their  importunity.     It  was  not  His 
object  to  become  the  centre  of  an  admiring  populace,  or  to  spend  His 
whole  time  in  working  miracles,  which,  though  they  were  deeds  of 
mercy,  were  mainly  intended  to   open  their  hearts  to   His   diviner 
teaching.      His   blessings  were  not  to  be   confined   to   Capernaum. 
Dalmanutha,  Magdala,  Bethsaida,  Chorazin,  were  all  near  at  hand. 
"  Let  us  go,"  He  said,  "  to  the  adjoining  country  towns,  to  preach  the 
kingdom  of  God  there  also  ;  for  therefore  am  I  sent." 

It  is  doubtful,  however,  whether  Jesus  put  His  intention  into 
instant  effect.  It  seems  as  if  He  so  far  yielded  to  the  anxiety  of  the 
multitude  as  to  give  them  one  more  address  before  He  set  forth  to 
preach  in  that  populous  neighbourhood.  He  bent  His  steps  towards 
the  shore,  and  probably  to  the  spot  where  the  little  boats  of  His 
earliest  disciples  were  anchored,  near  the  beach  of  hard  white  sand 
which  lines  the  water-side  at  Bethsaida.  At  a  little  distance  behind 
Him  followed  an  ever-gathering  concourse  of  people  from  all  the 
neighbourhood  ;  and  while  He  stopped  to  speak  to  them,  the  two  pairs 
of  fisher-brethren,  Simon  and  Andrew,  and  James  and  John,  pursued 
the  toils  by  which  they  earned  their  daily  bread.  While  Jesus  had 


112  THE   LIFE   OP   CHRIST. 

retired  to  rest  for  a  few  short  hours  of  the  night,  Simon,  and  his  com- 
panions, impelled  by  the  necessities  of  a  lot  which  they  seem  to  have 
borne  with  noble-minded  cheerfulness,  had  been  engaged  in  fishing ; 
and,  having  been  wholly  unsuccessful,  two  of  them,  seated  on  the  shore 
— probably,  in  that  clear  still  atmosphere,  within  hearing  of  His  voice — 
were  occupying  their  time  in  washing,  and  two,  seated  in  their  boat 
with  their  hired  servants,  and  Zebedee,  their  father,  were  mending 
their  nets.  As  Jesus  spoke,  the  multitude — some  in  their  desire  to 
catch  every  syllable  that  fell  from  the  lips  of  Him  who  spake  as  never 
man  spake,  and  some  in  their  longing  to  touch  Him,  and  so  be  healed 
of  whatever  plagues  they  had — thronged  upon  Him  closer  and  closer, 
impeding  his  movements  with  dangerous  and  unseemly  pressure. 
He  therefore  beckoned  to  Simon  to  get  into  his  boat  and  push  it 
ashore,  so  that  He  might  step  on  board  of  it,  and  teach  the  people  from 
thence.  Seated  in  this  pleasant  pulpit,  safe  from  the  inconvenient 
contact  with  the  multitude,  He  taught  them  from  the  little  boat  as  it 
rocked  on  the  blue  ripples,  sparkling  in  the  morning  sun.  And  when 
His  sermon  was  over,  He  thought  not  of  Himself  and  of  His  own 
fatigue,  but  of  His  poor  and  disappointed  disciples.  He  knew  that 
they  had  toiled  in  vain;  He  had  observed  that  even  while  He  spoke 
they  had  been  preparing  for  some  future  and  more  prosperous 
expedition ;  and  with  a  sympathy  which  never  omitted  an  act  of 
kindness,  He  ordered  Peter  to  push  out  his  boat  into  the  deep,  and  all  of 
them  to  cast  out  their  nets  once  more.  Peter  was  in  a  despondent  mood  ; 
but  the  mere  word  of  One  whom  he  so  deeply  reverenced,  and  whose 
power  he  had  already  witnessed,  was  sufficient.  And  his  faith  was 
rewarded.  Instantly  a  vast  haul  of  fishes  crowded  into  the  nets. 

A  busy  scene  followed.  The  instinct  of  work  first  prevailed. 
Simon  and  Andrew  beckoned  to  Zebedee  and  his  sons  and  servants  to 
come  in  their  boat  and  help  to  save  the  miraculous  draught  and 
straining  nets ;  both  boats  were  filled  to  the  gunwale  with  the  load ; 
and  at  the  first  moment  that  the  work  was  finished,  and  Peter 
recognised  the  whole  force  of  the  miracle,  ho  falls,  with  his  usual  eager 
impetuosity,  at  his  Master's  feet — to  thank  him  ?  to  offer  Him  hence- 
forth an  absolute  devotion  ?  No ;  but  (and  here  we  have  a  touch  of 
indescribable  truthfulness,  utterly  beyond  the  power  of  the  most 
consummate  intellect  to  have  invented)  to  exclaim,  "  DEPART  FROM  ME, 
for  I  am  a  sinful  man,  0  Lord  ! "  A  flash  of  supernatural  illumination 
had  revealed  to  him  both  his  own  sinful  unworthiness  and  who  HE  was 
who  was  with  him  in  the  boat.  It  was  the  cry  of  self-loathing  which 
had  already  realised  something  nobler.  It  was  the  first  impulse  of  fear 


THE   LIFJJ   OF  CHRIST. 

and  amazemeu ,,  before  they  had  had  time  to  grow  into  adoration  and 
love.  St.  Peter  did  not  mean  the  "Depart  from  me;"  hQ  only  meant 
— and  this  was  known  to  the  Searcher  of  hearts — "  I  am  utterly 
unworthy  to  be  near  Thee,  yet  let  me  stay."  How  unlike  was  this  cry 
of  his  passionate  and  trembling  humility  to  the  bestial  ravings  of  the 
unclean  spirits,  who  bade  the  Lord  to  let  them  alone,  or  to  the 
hardened  degradation  of  the  filthy  Gadarenes,  who  preferred  to  the 
presence  of  their  Saviour  the  tending  of  their  swine  ! 

And  how  gently  the  answer  came :  "  Fear  not ;  from  henceforth 
thoa  shalt  catch  men."  Our  Lord,  as  in  all  His  teaching,  seized  and 
applied  with  exquisite  significance  the  circumstances  of  the  moment. 
Bound  them  in  the  little  boat  lay  in  heaps  the  glittering  spoil  of  the 
lake — glittering,  but  with  a  glitter  that  began  to  fade  in  death. 
Henceforth  that  sinful  man,  washed  and  cleansed,  and  redeemed 
and  sanctified,  was  to  chase,  with  nobler  labour,  a  spoil  which,  by 
being  entangled  in  the  Gospel  net,  would  not  die,  bat  be  saved  alive. 
And  his  brother,  and  his  partners,  they,  too,  were  to  become  "  fishers 
of  men."  This  final  call  was  enough.  They  had  already  been  called 
by  Jesus  on  the  banks  of  Jordan  ;  they  had  already  heard  the  Baptist's 
testimony ;  but  they  had  not  yet  been  bidden  to  forsake  all  and  follow 
Him;  they  had  not  yet  grown  familiar  with  the  miracles  of  power  which 
confirmed  their  faith ;  they  had  not  yet  learned  fully  to  recognise  that 
they  who  followed  Him  were  not  only  safe  in  His  holy  keeping,  but 
should  receive  a  thousandfold  more  in  all  that  constitutes  true  and 
noble  happiness  even  in  this  life — in  the  world  to  come,  life  everlasting. 

We  have  already  seen  that,  at  the  very  beginning  of  His  ministry, 
our  Lord  had  prepared  six  of  His  Apostles  for  a  call  to  his  future 
service ;  four  of  whom  were  on  this  occasion  bidden  not  only  to"  regard 
Him  as  their  Master,  but  henceforth  to  leave  all  and  follow  Him. 
There  was  but  one  other  of  the  Apostles  who  received  a  separate  call 
— the  Evangelist,  St.  Matthew.  His  call,  though  narrated  in  different 
sequences  by  each  of  the  Synoptists,  probably  took  place  about  this 
time.  At  or  near  Capernaum  there  was  a  receipt  of  custom.  Lying 
as  the  town  did  at  the  nucleus  of  roads  which  diverged  to  Tyre, 
to  Damascus,  to  Jerusalem,  and  to  Sepphoris,  it  was  a  busy  centre  of 
merchandise,  and  therefore  a  natural  place  for  the  collection  of  tribute 
and  taxes.  These  imposts  were  to  the  Jews  pre-eminently  distasteful. 
The  mere  fact  of  having  to  pay  them  wounded  their  tenderest  sensi- 
bilities. They  were  not  only  a  badge  of  servitude ;  they  were  not 
only  a  daily  and  terrible  witness  that  God  seemed  to  have  forsaken 
His  land,  and  that  all  the  splendid  Messianic  hopes  and  promises  of 


il4  THE   LIFE    OP   CHEIST. 

their  earlier  history  were  merged  in  the  disastrous  twilight  of  sub- 
jugation to  a  foreign  rule  which  was  cruelly  and  contemptuously 
enforced ;  but,  more  than  this,  the  mere  payment  of  such  imposts 
nore  almost  the  appearance  of  apostacy  to  the  sensitive  and  scrupulous 
mind  of  a  genuine  Jew.  It  seemed  to  be  a  violation  of  the  first  prin- 
ciples of  the  Theocracy,  such  as  could  only  be  excused  as  the  result 
of  absolute  compulsion.  We  cannot,  therefore,  wonder  that  the 
officers  who  gathered  these  taxes  were  regarded  with  profound  dislike. 
It  must  be  remembered  that  those  with  whom  the  provincials  came 
in  contact  were  not  the  Roman  knights — the  real  pulilicani,  who  farmed 
the  taxes — but  were  the  merest  subordinates,  often  chosen  from  the 
dregs  of  the  people,  and  so  notorious  as  a  class  for  their  malpractices, 
that  they  were  regarded  almost  with  horror,  and  were  always  included 
in  the  same  category  with  harlots  and  sinners.  When  an  occupation 
is  thus  despised  and  detested,  it  is  clear  that  its  members  are  apt  to 
sink  to  the  level  at  which  they  are  placed  by  the  popular  odium. 
And  if  a  Jew  could  scarcely  persuade  himself  that  it  was  right  to 
pay  taxes,  how  much  more  heinous  a  crime  must  it  have  been  in  his 
eyes  to  become  the  questionably-honest  instrument  for  collecting  them  ? 
If  a  publican  was  hated,  how  still  more  intense  must  have  been  the 
disgust  entertained  against  a  publican  who  was  also  a  Jew  ? 

But  He  who  came  to  seek  and  save  the  lost — He  who  could  evoke 
Christian  holiness  out  of  the  midst  of  heathen  corruption — could 
make,  even  out  of  a  Jewish  publican,  the  Apostle  and  the  first  Evan- 
gelist of  a  new  and  living  Faith.  His  choice  of  apostles  was  dictated 
by  a  spirit  far  different  from  that  of  calculating  policy  or  conventional 
prudence.  He  rejected  the  dignified  scribe  (Matt.  viii.  19)  ;  He  chose 
the  despised  and  hated  tax-gatherer.  It  was  the  glorious  unworld- 
liness  of  a  Divine  insight  and  a  perfect  charity,  and  St.  Matthew  more 
than  justified  it  by  turning  his  knowledge  of  writing  to  a  sacred  use, 
and  becoming  the  earliest  biographer  of  his  Saviour  and  his  Lord. 

No  doubt  Matthew  had  heard  some  of  the  discourses,  had  seen 
some  of  the  miracles  of  Christ.  His  heart  had  been  touched,  and  to 
the  eyes  of  Him  who  despised  none  and  despaired  of  none,  the 
publican,  even  as  he  sat  at  "  the  receipt  of  custom,"  was  ready  for  the 
call.  One  word  was  enough.  The  "  Follow  me "  which  showed  to 
Matthew  that  his  Lord  loved  him,  and  was  ready  to  use  him  as  a 
chosen  instrument  in  spreading  the  good  tidings  of  the  kingdom  of 
God,  was  sufficient  to  break  the  temptations  of  avarice  and  the 
routine  of  a  daily  calling,  and  "he  left  all,  rose  up,  and  followed 
Him,"  touched  into  noblest  transformation  by  the  Ithuriel-spear  of  a 
forgiving  and  redeeming  love. 


TUB   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  115 

CHAPTER  XVin. 

THE  TWELVE,  AND  THE  SERMON  ON  THE  HOUNI. 

AFTER  one  of  His  days  of  loving  and  ceaseless  toil,  Jesus,  as  was  His 
wont,  found  rest  and  peace  in  prayer.  "  He  went  out  into  a  mountain" 
— or,  as  it  should  rather  be  rendered,  into  the  mountain — "  to  pray, 
and  continued  all  night  in  prayer  to  God."  There  is  something  affect- 
ing beyond  measure  in  the  thought  of  these  lonely  hours  ;  the  absolute 
silence  and  stillness,  broken  by  no  sounds  of  human  life,  but  only  by 
the  hooting  of  the  night- jar  or  the  howl  of  the  jackal ;  the  stars  of  an 
Eastern  heaven  raining  their  large  lustre  out  of  the  unfathomable 
depth ;  the  figure  of  the  Man  of  Sorrows  kneeling  upon  the  dewy 
grass,  and  gaining  strength  for  His  labours  from  the  purer  air,  the 
more  open  heaven,  of  that  intense  and  silent  communing  with  His 
Father  and  His  God. 

The  scene  of  this  lonely  vigil,  and  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount, 
was  in  all  probability  the  singular  elevation  known  at  this  day  as  the 
Kurn  Hattin,  or  "  Horns  of  Hattin."  It  is  a  hill  with  a  summit  which 
closely  resembles  an  Oriental  saddle  with  its  two  high  peaks.  On  the 
west  it  rises  very  little  above  the  level  of  a  broad  and  undulating  plain ; 
on  the  east  it  sinks  precipitately  towards  a  plateau,  on  which  lies, 
immediately  beneath  the  cliffs,  the  village  of  Hattin ;  and  from  this 
plateau  the  traveller  descends  through  a  wild  and  tropic  gorge  to  the 
shining  levels  of  the  Lake  of  Galilee.  It  is  the  only  conspicuous  hill 
on  the  western  side  of  the  lake,  and  it  is  singularly  adapted  by  its 
conformation,  both  to  form  a  place  for  short  retirement  and  a  rendez- 
vous for  gathering  multitudes.  Hitherward,  in  all  probability,  our 
Lord  wandered  in  the  evening  between  the  rugged  and  brigand- 
haunted  crags  which  form  the  sides  of  the  Vale  of  Doves,  stopping, 
perhaps,  at  times  to  drink  the  clear  water  of  the  little  stream,  to 
gather  the  pleasant  apples  of  the  nulk,  and  to  watch  the  eagles 
swooping  down  on  some  near  point  of  rock.  And  hither,  in  the 
morning,  less  heedful  than  their  Divine  Master  of  the  manifold 
beauties  of  the  scene,  the  crowd  followed  Him — loth  even  for  a  time 
to  lose  His  inspiring  presence,  eager  to  listen  to  the  gracious  words 
that  proceeded  out  of  His  mouth. 

It  was  at  dawn  of  day,  and  before  the  crowd  had  assembled, 
that  our  Lord  summoned  into  His  presence  the  disciples  who  had 
gradually  gathered  around  Him.  Hitherto  the  relation  which  bound 

I  2 


116  THE   LIFE   OF  CHBIST. 

them  to  His  person  seems  to  hare  been  loose  and  partial ;  and  it  is 
doubtful  whether  they  at  all  realised  its  full  significance.  But  now 
the  hour  was  come,  and  out  of  the  wider  band  of  general  followers  He 
made  the  final  and  special  choice  of  His  twelve  Apostles.  Their  number 
•was  insignificant  compared  to  the  pompous  retinue  of  hundreds  who 
called  themselves  followers  of  a  Hillel  or  a  Gamaliel,  and  their  position 
in  life  was  humble  and  obscure.  Simon  and  Andrew  the  sons  of  Jonas, 
James  and  John  the  sons  of  Zabdia,  and  Philip,  were  of  the  little 
village  of  Bethsaida.  If  Matthew  be  the  same  as  Levi,  he  was  a  son 
of  Alphaeus,  and  therefore  a  brother  of  James  the  Less  and  of  Jude, 
the  brother  of  James,  who  is  generally  regarded  as  identical  with 
Lebbteus  and  Thaddseus.  They  belonged  in  all  probability  to  Cana  or 
Capernaum,  and  if  there  were  any  ground  for  believing  the  tradition 
which  says  that  Mary,  the  wife  of  Alphaeus  or  Klopas,  was  a  younger 
sister  of  the  Virgin,  then  we  should  have  to  consider  these  two  brothers 
as  first-cousins  of  our  Lord.  Nathanael  or  Bartholomew  was  of  Cana 
in  Galilee.  ~  Thomas  and  Simon  Zelotes  were  also  Galilseans.  Judas 
Iscariot  was  the  son  of  a  Simon  Iscariot,  but  whether  this  Simon  is 
identical  with  the  Zealot  cannot  be  determined. 

Of  these,  "the  glorious  company  of  the  Apostles,"  three,  James  the 
Less,  Jude  [the  brother]  of  James,  and  Simon  Zelotes,  are  almost 
totally  unknown.  The  very  personality  of  James  and  Jude  is  involved 
in  numerous  and  difficult  problems,  caused  by  the  extreme  frequency 
of  those  names  among  the  Jews.  Whether  they  are  the  authors  of 
the  two  Catholic  Epistles,  is  a  question  which,  perhaps,  will  never  be 
determined.  Nor  is  anything  of  individual  interest  recorded  about 
them  in  the  Gospels,  if  we  except  the  single  question  of  "  Judas,  not 
Iscariot,"  which  is  mentioned  by  St.  John.  Simon  is  only  known  by 
his  surnames  of  Zelotes,  "  the  Zealot,"  or  "  the  Canaanite  " — names 
which  are  identical  in  meaning,  and  which  mark  him  out  as  having 
once  belonged  to  the  wild  and  furious  followers  of  Judas  of  Giscala. 
The  Greek  names  of  Philip  and  Andrew,  together  with  the  fact  that  it 
was  to  Philip  that  the  Greeks  applied  who  wished  for  an  interview 
with  our  Lord,  and  his  reference  of  the  request  to  Andrew,  may 
possibly  point  to  some  connection  on  their  part  with  the  Hellenists ; 
but,  besides  their  first  call,  almost  nothing  is  recorded  about  them ; 
and  the  same  remark  applies  to  Nathanael  and  to  Matthew.  Of 
Thomas,  called  also  Didymus,  or  "  the  Twin,"  which  is  only  a  Greek 
version  of  his  Hebrew  name,  we  catch  several  interesting  glimpses, 
which  show  a  well-marked  character,  naive  and  simple,  but  at  the 
same  time  ardent  and  generous ;  ready  to  die,  yet  slow  to  believe.  Of 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  117 

Judas,  the  man  of  Kerioth,  perhaps  the  only  Jew  in  the  Apostolic 
band,  we  shall  have  sad  occasion  to  speak  hereafter ;  and  thonghont 
the  Gospels  he  is  often  branded  by  the  fatal  epitaph,  so  terrible  in  its 
very  simplicity,  "Judas  Iscariot,  who  also  betrayed  Him." 

James,  John,  and  Peter  belonged  to  the  innermost  circle — tho 
eVXe/rrwi/  €K\eKTOT€poi — of  our  Lord's  associates  and  friends.  They 
alone  were  admitted  into  His  presence  when  He  raised  the  daughter 
of  Jairus,  and  at  His  transfiguration,  and  during  His  agony  in  the 
garden.  Of  James  we  know  nothing  further  except  that  to  him  was 
granted  the  high  honour  of  being  the  first  martyr  in  the  Apostolic 
band.  He  and  his  brother  John  seem,  although  they  were  fishermen, 
to  have  been  in  easier  circumstances  than  their  associates.  Zobedee, 
their  father,  not  only  had  his  own  boat,  but  also  his  own  hired 
servants;  and  John  mentions  incidentally  in  his  Gospel  that  he  "was 
known  to  the  high  priest."  We  have  already  noticed  the  not  im- 
probable conjecture  that  he  resided  much  at  Jerusalem,  and  there 
managed  the  importing  of  the  fish  which  were  sent  thither  from  tho 
Sea  of  Galilee.  We  should  thus  be  able  to  account  for  his  more 
intimate  knowledge  of  those  many  incidents  of  our  Lord's  ministry 
in  Juda>a  which  have  been  entirely  omitted  by  the  other  Evangelists. 

St.  John  and  St.  Peter — the  one  the  symbol  of  the  contemplative, 
the  other  of  the  practical  life — are  undoubtedly  the  grandest  and  most 
attractive  figures  in  that  Apostolic  band.  Tho  character  of  St.  John 
has  been  often  mistaken.  Pilled  as  he  was  -with  a  most  divine 
tenderness — realising  as  he  did  to  a  greater  extent  than  any  of  the 
Apostles  the  full  depth  and  significance  of  our  Lord's  new  command- 
ment— rich  as  his  Epistles  and  his  Gospel  are  with  a  meditative  and 
absorbing  reverence — dear  as  he  has  ever  been  in  consequence  to  the 
heart  of  the  mystic  and  the  saint — yet  he  was  something  indefinitely 
far  removed  from  that  effeminate  pietist  which  has  furnished  tho 
usual  type  under  which  he  has  been  represented.  The  name  Boan- 
erges, or  "  Sons  of  Thunder,"  which  he  shared  with  his  brother 
James,  their  joint  petition  for  precedence  in  the  kingdom  of  God, 
their  passionate  request  to  call  down  fire  from  heaven  on  the  offending 
village  of  the  Samaritans,  the  burning  energy  of  the  patois  in  which 
(he  Apocalypse  is  written,  the  impetuous  horror  with  which,  according 
to  tradition,  St.  John  recoiled  from  the  presence  of  the  heretic  Cerin- 
thns,  all  show  that  in  him  was  the  spirit  of  the  eagle,  which,  rather 
than  the  dove,  has  been  his  immemorial  symbol.  And  since  zeal  and 
enthusiasm,  dead  as  they  are,  and  scorned  in  these  days  by  an  effete 
and  comfortable  religionism,  yet  have  ever  been  indispensable  instru- 


118  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

ments  in  spreading  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven,  doubtless  it  was  the 
existence  of  these  elements  in  his  character,  side  by  side  with 
tenderness  and  devotion,  which  endeared  him  so  greatly  to  his 
Master,  and  made  him  the  "  disciple  whom  Jesus  loved."  The 
wonderful  depth  and  power  of  his  imagination,  the  rare  combination 
of  contemplativeness  and  passion,  of  strength  and  sweetness,  in  the 
same  soul — the  perfect  faith  which  inspired  his  devotion,  and  the 
perfect  love  which  precluded  fear — these  were  the  gifts  and  graces 
which  rendered  him  worthy  of  leaning  his  young  head  on  the  bosom 
of  his  Lord. 

Nor  is  his  friend  Sfc.  Peter  a  less  interesting  study.  We  shall  have 
many  opportunities  of  observing  the  generous,  impetuous,  wavering, 
noble,  timid,  impulses  of  his  thoroughly  human  but  most  lovable  dis- 
position. Let  the  brief  but  vivid  summary  of  another  now  suffice. 
"  It  would  be  hard  to  tell,"  says  Dr.  Hamilton,  "  whether  most  of  his 
fervour  flowed  through  the  outlet  of  adoration  or  activity.  His  full 
heart  put  force  and  promptitude  into  every  movement.  Is  his  Master 
encompassed  by  fierce  ruffians  ? — Peter's  ardour  flashes  in  his  ready 
sword,  and  converts  the  Gulilaean  boatman  into  the  soldier  instanta- 
neously. Is  there  a  rumour  of  a  resurrection  from  Joseph's  tomb  ? — 
John's  nimbler  foot  distances  his  older  friend ;  but  Peter's  eagerness 
outruns  the  serene  love  of  John,  and  past  the  gazing  disciple  he 
rushes  breathless  into  the  vacant  sepulchre.  Is  the  risen  Saviour  on 
the  strand  ? — his  comrades  secure  the  net,  and  turn  the  vessel's  head 
for  shore ;  but  Peter  plunges  over  the  vessel's  side,  and  struggling 
through  the  waves,  in  his  dripping  coat  falls  down  at  his  Master's  feet. 
Does  Jesus  say,  '  Bring  of  the  fish  ye  have  caught  ?  ' — ere  any  one 
could  anticipate  the  word,  Peter's  brawny  arm  is  lugging  the  weltering 
net  with  its  glittering  spoil  ashore,  and  every  eager  movement  unwit- 
tingly is  answering  beforehand  the  question  of  his  Lord,  '  Simon, 
lovest  thou  me  ? '  And  that  fervour  is  the  best,  which,  like  Peter's, 
and  as  occasion  requires,  can  ascend  in  ecstatic  ascriptions  of  adora- 
tion and  praise,  or  follow  Christ  to  prison  and  to  death ;  which  can 
concentrate  itself  on  feats  of  heroic  devotion,  or  distribute  itself  in 
the  affectionate  assiduities  of  a  miscellaneous  industry." 

Such  were  the  chief  of  the  Apostles  whom  their  Lord  united  into 
one  band  as  He  sat  on  the  green  summit  of  Kurn  Hattin.  We  may 
suppose  that  on  one  of  those  two  peaks  He  had  passed  the  night  in 
prayer,  and  had  there  been  joined  by  His  disciples  at  the  early  dawn. 
By  what  external  symbol,  if  by  any,  our  Lord  ratified  this  first  great 
ordination  to  the  Apostolate  we  do  not  know;  but  undoubtedly  the 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  119 

present  choice  was  regarded  as  formal  and  as  final.  Henceforth  there 
was  to  be  no  return  to  the  fisher's  boat  or  the  publican's  booth  as  a 
source  of  sustenance ;  but  the  disciples  were  to  share  the  wandering 
missions,  the  evangelic  labours,  the  scant  meal  and  uncertain  home, 
which  marked  even  the  happiest  period  of  the  ministry  of  their  Lord. 
They  were  to  be  weary  with  Him  under  the  burning  noonday,  and  to 
sleep,  as  He  did,  under  the  starry  sky. 

And  while  the  choice  was  being  made,  a  vast  promiscuous  multi- 
titnde  had  begun  to  gather.  Not  only  from  the  densely-populated 
shores  of  the  Sea  of  Galilee,  but  even  from  Judaea  and  Jerusalem — 
nay,  even  [from  the  distant  sea-coasts  of  Tyre  and  Sidon — they  had 
crowded  to  touch  His  person  and  hear  His  words.  From  the  peak 
He  descended  to  the  flat  summit  of  the  hill,  and  first  of  all  occupied 
Himself  with  the  physical  wants  of  those  anxious  hearers,  healing 
their  diseases,  and  dispossessing  the  unclean  spirits  of  the  souls  which 
they  had  seized.  And  then,  when  the  multitude  were  seated  in  calm 
and  serious  attention  on  the  grassy  sides  of  that  lovely  natural  amphi- 
theatre, He  raised  His  eyes,  which  had,  perhaps,  been  bent  downwards 
for  a  few  moments  of  inward  prayer,  and  opening  His  mouth, 
delivered  primarily  to  His  disciples,  but  intending  through  them  to, 
address  the  multitude,  that  memorable  discourse  which  will  be  known 
for  ever  as  "  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount." 

The  most  careless  reader  has  probably  been  struck  with  the  con- 
trast between  the  delivery  of  this  sermon  and  the  delivery  of  the  Law 
on  Sinai.  We  think  of  that  as  a  "  fiery  law,"  whose  promulgation  is 
surrounded  by  the  imagery  of  thunders,  and  lightnings,  and  the  voice 
of  the  trumpet  sounding  long  and  waxing  louder  and  louder.  We 
think  of  this  as  flowing  forth  in  divinest  music  amid  all  the  calm 
and  loveliness  of  the  clear  and  quiet  dawn.  That  came  dreadfully  to 
the  startled  conscience  from  an  Unseen  Presence,  shrouded  by  wreath- 
ing clouds,  and  destroying  fire,  and  eddying  smoke ;  this  was  uttered 
by  a  sweet  human  voice  that  moved  the  heart  most  gently  in  words  of 
peace.  That  was  delivered  on  the  desolate  and  storm-rent  hill  which 
seems  with  its  red  granite  crags  to  threaten  the  scorching  wilderness ; 
this  on  the  flowery  grass  of  the  green  hill-side  which  slopes  down  to 
the  silver  lake.  That  shook  the  heart  with  terror  and  agitation  ;  this 
soothed  it  with  peace  and  love.  And  yet  the  New  Commandments  of 
the  Mount  of  Beatitudes  were  n6t  meant  to  abrogate,  but  rather  to 
complete,  the  Law  which  was  spoken  from  Sinai  to  them  of  old. 
That  Law  was  founded  on  the  eternal  distinctions  of  right  and  wrong 
— distinctions  strong  and  irremovable  as  the  granite  bases  of  the 


120  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

world.  Easier  would  it  be  to  sweep  away  the  heaven  and  the  earth, 
than  to  destroy  the  least  letter,  one  yod — or  the  least  point  of  a  letter, 
one  projecting  horn — of  that  code  which  contains  the  very  principles 
of  all  moral  life.  Jesus  warned  them  that  He  came,  not  to  abolish 
that  Law,  but  to  obey  and  to  fulfil;  while  at  the  same  time  He  taught 
that  this  obedience  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  Levitical  scrupulosity 
of  a  superstitious  adherence  to  the  letter,  but  was  rather  a  surrender 
of  the  heart  and  will  to  the  innermost  meaning  and  spirit  which  the 
commands  involved.  He  fulfilled  that  olden  Law  by  perfectly  keeping 
it,  and  by  imparting  a  power  to  keep  it  to  all  who  believe  in  Him, 
even  though  He  made  its  cogency  so  far  more  universal  and  pro- 
found. 

The  sermon  began  with  the  word  "blessed,"  and  with  an  octave  of 
beatitudes.  But  it  was  a  new  revelation  of  beatitude.  The  people 
were  expecting  a  Messiah  who  should  break  the  yoke  off  their  necks 
— a  king  clothed  in  earthly  splendour,  and  manifested  in  the  pomp  of 
victory  and  vengeance.  Their  minds  were  haunted  with  legendary 
prophecies,  as  to  how  He  should  stand  on  the  shore  at  Joppa,  and  bid 
the  sea  pour  out  its  pearls  and  treasure  at  His  feet;  how  He  should 
clothe  them  with  jewels  and  scarlet,  and  feed  them  with  even  a  sweeter 
manna  than  the  wilderness  had  known.  But  Christ  reveals  to  them 
another  King,  another  happiness — the  riches  of  poverty,  the  royalty  of 
meekness,  the  high  beatitude  of  sorrow  and  persecution.  And  this 
new  Law,  which  should  not  only  command  but  also  aid,  was  to  be  set 
forth  in  beneficent  manifestation — at  once  as  salt  to  preserve  the  world 
from  corruption,  and  as  a  light  to  guide  it  in  the  darkness.  And  then 
follows  a  comparison  of  the  new  Law  of  mercy  with  the  old  Law  of 
threatening;  the  old  was  transitory,  this  permanent;  the  old  was  a 
type  and  shadow,  the  new  a  fulfilment  and  completion;  the  old  de- 
manded obedience  in  outward  action,  the  new  was  to  permeate  the 
thoughts ;  the  old  contained  the  rule  of  conduct,  the  new  the  secret  of 
obedience.  The  command,  "  Thou  shalt  not  murder,"  was  henceforth 
extended  to  angry  words  and  feelings  of  hatred.  The  germ  of  adultery 
was  shown  to  be  involved  in  a  lascivious  look.  The  prohibition  of 
perjury  was  extended  to  every  vain  and  unnecessary  oath.  The  law 
of  equivalent  revenge  was  superseded  by  a  law  of  absolute  self- 
abnegation.  The  love  due  to  our  neighbour  was  extended  also  to  our 
enemy.  Henceforth  the  children  of  the  kingdom  were  to  aim  at 
nothing  less  than  this — namely,  to  be  perfect,  as  their  Father  in 
heaven  is  perfect. 

And  the  new  life  which  was  to  issue  from  this  new  Law  was  to  be 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHEIST.  121 

contrasted  in  all  respects  with  that  routine  of  exaggerated  scruples 
and  Pharisaic  formalism  which  had  hitherto  been  regarded  as  the 
highest  type  of  religious  conversation.  Alms  were  to  be  given,  not 
with  noisy  ostentation,  but  in  modest  secrecy.  Prayers  were  to  be 
uttered,  not  with  hypocritic  publicity,  but  in  holy  solitude.  Fasting 
was  to  be  exercised,  not  as  a  belauded  virtue,  but  as  a  private  self- 
denial.  And  all  these  acts  of  devotion  were  to  be  offered  with  sole 
reference  to  the  love  of  God,  in  a  simplicity  which  sought  no  earthly 
reward,  but  which  stored  up  for  itself  a  heavenly  and  incorruptible 
treasure.  And  the  service  to  be  sincere  must  be  entire  and  undis- 
tracted.  The  cares  and  the  anxieties  of  life  were  not  to  divert  its 
earnestness  or  to  trouble  its  repose.  The  God  to  whom  it  was  directed 
was  a  Father  also,  and  He  who  ever  feeds  the  fowls  of  the  air,  which 
neither  sow  nor  reap,  and  clothes  in  their  more  than  regal  loveliness 
the  flowers  of  the  field,  would  not  fail  to  clothe  and  feed,  and  that 
without  any  need  for  their  own  toilsome  anxiety,  the  children  who 
seek  His  righteousness  as  their  first  desire. 

And  what  should  be  the  basis  of  such  service  ?  The  self-examina- 
tion which  issues  in  a  gentleness  which  will  not  condemn,  in  a  charity 
that  cannot  believe,  in  an  ignorance  that  will  not  know,  the  sins  of 
others ;  the  reserve  which  will  not  waste  or  degrade  things  holy ;  the 
faith  which  seeks  for  strength  from  above,  and  knows  that,  seeking 
rightly,  it  shall  obtain ;  the  self-denial  which,  in  the  desire  to  increase 
God's  glory  and  man's  happiness,  sees  the  sole  guide  of  its  actions 
towards  all  the  world. 

The  gate  was  strait,  the  path  narrow,  but  it  led  to  life  ;  by  the  lives 
and  actions  of  those  who  professed  to  live  by  it,  and  point  it  out,  they 
were  to  judge  whether  their  doctrine  was  true  or  false  ;  without  this 
neither  words  of  orthodoxy  would  avail,  nor  works  of  power. 

Lastly,  He  warned  them  that  he  who  heard  these  sayings  and  did 
them  was  like  a  wise  man  who  built  a  house  with  foundations  dug 
deeply  into  the  living  rock,  whose  house,  because  it  was  founded  upon 
a  rock,  stood  unshaken  amid  the  vehement  beating  of  storm  and  surge  : 
but  he  who  heard  and  did  them  not  was  likened  "  unto  a  foolish  man 
that  built  his  house  upon  the  sand ;  and  the  rain  descended,  and  the 
floods  came,  and  the  winds  blew  and  beat  upon  that  house  :  and  it  fell, 
and  great  was  the  fall  of  it." 

Such  in  barest  and  most  colourless  outline  are  the  topics  of  that 
mighty  sermon ;  nor  is  it  marvellous  that  they  who  heard  it  "  were 
astonished  at  the  doctrine."  Their  main  astonishment  was  that  Ho 
taught  "  as  one  having  authority,  and  not  as  the  Scribes."  The 


122  THE   LIFE   OF  CHBIST. 

teaching  of  their  Scribes  was  narrow,  dogmatical,  material ;  it  was 
cold  in  manner,  frivolous  in  matter,  second-hand,  and  iterative  in  its 
very  essence  ;  with  no  freshness  in  it,  no  force,  no  fire  ;  servile  to  all 
authority,  opposed  to  all  independence ;  at  once  erudite  and  foolish,  at 
once  contemptuous  and  mean ;  never  passing  a  hair's  breadth  beyond 
the  carefully- watched  boundary  line  of  commentary  and  precedent; 
full  of  balanced  inference,  and  orthodox  hesitancy,  and  impossible 
literalism;  intricate  with  legal  pettiness  and  labyrinthine  system 
elevating  mere  memory  above  genius,  and  repetition  above  origi- 
nality; concerned  only  about  Priests  and  Pharisees,  in  Temple  and 
synagogue,  or  school,  or  Sanhedrin,  and  mostly  occupied  with  things 
infinitely  little.  It  was  not  indeed  wholly  devoid  of  moral  significance, 
nor  is  it  impossible  to  find  here  and  there,  among  the  debris  of  it, 
a  noble  thought ;  but  it  was  occupied  a  thousandfold  more  with 
Levitical  minutiae  about  mint,  and  anise,  and  cummin,  and  the  length  of 
fringes,  and  the  breadth  of  phylacteries,  and  the  washing  of  cups  and 
platters,  and  the  particular  quarter  of  a  second  when  new  moons  and 
Sabbath  days  began.  But  this  teaching  of  Jesus  was  wholly  different 
in  its  character,  and  as  much  grander  as  the  temple  of  the  morning 
sky  under  which  it  was  uttered  was  grander  than  stifling  synagogue  or 
crowded  school.  It  was  preached,  as  each  occasion  rose,  on  the  hill- 
side, or  by  the  lake,  or  on  the  roads,  or  in  the  house  of  the  Pharisee, 
or  at  the  banquet  of  the  publican ;  nor  was  it  any  sweeter  or  loftier 
when  it  was  addressed  in  the  Royal  Portico  to  the  Masters  of  Israel, 
than  when  its  only  hearers  were  the  ignorant  people  whom  the  haughty 
Pharisees  held  to  be  accursed.  And  there  was  no  reserve  in  its  ad- 
ministration. It  flowed  forth  as  sweetly  and  as  lavishly  to  single 
listeners  as  to  enraptured  crowds  ;  and  some  of  its  very  richest  revela- 
tions were  vouchsafed,  neither  to  rulers  nor  to  multitudes,  but  to  the 
persecuted  outcast  of  the  Jewish  synagogue,  to  the  timid  inquirer  in 
the  lonely  midnight,  and  the  frail  woman  by  the  noonday  well.  And 
it  dealt,  not  with  scrupulous  tithes  and  ceremonial  cleansings,  but  with 
^he  human  soul,  and  human  destiny,  and  human  life — with  Hope  and 
Charity,  and  Faith.  There  were  no  definitions  in  it,  or  explanations, 
or  "  scholastic  systems,"  or  philosophic  theorising,  or  implicated  mazes 
of  difficult  and  dubious  discussion,  but  a  swift  intuitive  insight  into 
the  very  depths  of  the  human  heart — even  a  supreme  and  daring 
paradox  that,  without  being  fenced  round  with  exceptions  or  limita- 
tions, appealed  to  tho  conscience  with  its  irresistible  simplicity,  and 
with  an  absolute  mastery  stirred  and  dominated  over  the  heart. 
Springing  from  the  depths  of  holy  emotions,  it  thrilled  the  being  of 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  123 

every  listener  as  with  electric  flame.  In  a  word,  its  authority  was  the 
authority  of  the  Divine  Incarnate  ;  it  was  a  Voice  of  God,  speaking  in 
the  utterance  of  man ;  its  austere  purity  was  yet  pervaded  with 
tenderest  sympathy,  and  its  awful  severity  with  an  unutterable  love. 
It  is,  to  borrow  the  image  of  the  wisest  of  the  Latin  Fathers,  a  great 
sea  whose  smiling  surface  breaks  into  refreshing  ripples  at  the  feet  of 
our  little  ones,  but  into  whose  unfathomable  depths  the  wisest  may 
gaze  with  the  shudder  of  amazement  and  the  thrill  of  love. 

And  we,  who  can  compare  Christ's  teaching — the  teaching  of  One 
whom  some  would  represent  to  have  been  no  more  than  the  Carpenter 
of  Nazareth — with  all  that  the  world  has  of  best  and  greatest  in 
Philosophy  and  Eloquence  and  Song,  must  not  we  too  add,  with  yet 
deeper  emphasis,  that  teaching  as  one  having  authority,  He  spake  as 
never  man  spake  ?  Other  teachers  have  by  God's  grace  uttered  words 
of  wisdom,  but  to  which  of  them  has  it  been  granted  to  regenerate 
mankind  ?  What  would  the  world  be  now  if  it  had  nothing  better 
than  the  dry  aphorisms  and  cautious  hesitations  of  Confucius,  or  the 
dubious  principles  and  dangerous  concessions  of  Plato  ?  Would 
humanity  have  made  the  vast  moral  advance  which  it  has  made,  if  no 
great  Prophet  from  on  High  had  furnished  it  with  anything  better 
than  Sakya  Mouni's  dreary  hope  of  a  nirvana,  to  be  won  by  unnatural 
asceticism,  or  than  Mahomet's  cynical  sanction  of  polygamy  and 
despotism  ?  Christianity  may  have  degenerated  in  many  respects 
from  its  old  and  great  ideal ;  it  may  have  lost  something  of  its  virgin 
purity — the  struggling  and  divided  Church  of  to-day  may  have 
waned,  during  these  long  centuries,  from  the  splendour  of  the  New 
Jerusalem  descending  out  of  heaven  from  God ;  but  is  Christendom 
no  better  than  what  Greece  became,  and  what  Turkey  and  Arabia  and 
China  are  ?  Does  Christianity  wither  the  nations  which  have 
accepted  it  with  the  atrophy  of  Buddhism,  or  the  blight  of  Islam  ? 
Even  as  a  moral  system — though  it  is  infinitely  more  than  a  moral 
system — we  do  not  concede  that  Christianity  is  unoriginal;  and  we 
besides  maintain  that  no  faith  has  ever  been  able  like  it  to  sway  the 
affections  and  hearts  of  men.  Other  religions  are  demonstrably 
defective  and  erroneous ;  ours  has  never  been  proved  to  be  otherwise 
than  perfect  and  entire;  other  systems  were  esoteric  and  exclusive, 
ours  simple  and  universal ;  others  temporary  and  for  the  few,  ours 
eternal  and  for  the  race.  K'ung  Foo-tze,  Sakya  Mouni,  Mahomet, 
could  not  even  conceive  the  ideal  of  a  society  without  falling  into 
miserable  error;  Christ  established  the  reality  of  an  eternal  and 
glorious  kingdom — whose  theory  for  all,  whose  history  in  the  world, 


124  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

prove  it  to  be  indeed  what  it  was  from  the  first  proclaimed  to  be — 
the  Kingdom  of  Heaven,  the  Kingdom  of  God. 

And  yet  how  exquisitely  and  freshly  simple  is  the  actual  language 
of  Christ  compared  with  all  other  teaching  that  has  ever  gained  the 
ear  of  the  world !  There  is  no  science  in  it,  no  art,  no  pomp  of 
demonstration,  no  carefulness  of  toil,  no  trick  of  rhetoricians,  no 
wisdom  of  the  schools.  Straight  as  an  arrow  to  the  mark  His 
precepts  pierce  to  the  very  depths  of  the  soul  and  spirit.  All  ia 
short,  clear,  precise,  full  of  holiness,  full  of  the  common  images  of 
daily  life.  There  is  scarcely  a  scene  or  object  familiar  to  the  Galilee 
of  that  day,  which  Jesus  did  not  use  as  a  moral  illustration  of  some 
glorious  promise  or  moral  law.  He  spoke  of  green  fields,  and 
springing  flowers,  and  the  budding  of  the  vernal  trees ;  of  the  red 
or  lowering  sky ;  of  sunrise  and  sunset ;  of  wind  and  rain ;  of  night 
and  storm  ;  of  clouds  and  lightning ;  of  stream  and  river ;  of  stars  and 
lamps ;  of  honey  and  salt ;  of  quivering  bulrushes  and  burning  weeds  ; 
of  rent  garments  and  bursting  wine > skins ;  of  eggs  and  serpents ;  of 
pearls  and  pieces  of  money ;  of  nets  and  fish.  Wine  and  wheat,  corn 
and  oil,  stewards  and  gardeners,  labourers  and  employers,  kings  and 
shepherds,  travellers  and  fathers  of  families,  courtiers  in  soft  clothing 
and  brides  in  nuptial  robes — all  these  are  found  in  His  discourses. 
He  knew  all  life,  and  had  gazed  on  it  with  a  kindly  as  well  as  a  kingly 
glance.  He  could  sympathise  with  its  joys  no  less  than  He  could  heal 
its  sorrows,  and  the  eyes  that  were  so  often  suffused  with  tears  as  they 
saw  the  sufferings  of  earth's  mourners  beside  the  bed  of  death,  had 
shone  also  with  a  kindlier  glow  as  they  watched  the  games  of  earth's 
happy  little  ones  in  the  green  fields  and  busy  streets. 


CHAPTER    XIX. 

FURTHER    MIRACLES. 


TUB  Inauguration  of  the  Great  Doctrine  was  immediately  followed 
.and  ratified  by  mighty  signs.  Jesus  went,  says  one  of  the  Fathers, 
from  teaching  to  miracle.  Having  taught  as  one  who  had  authority, 
He  proceeded  to  confirm  that  authority  by  accordant  deeds. 

It  might  have  been  thought  that  after  a  night  of  ceaseless  prayer 


THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  125 

under  the  open  sky,  followed  at  early  dawn  by  the  choice  of  Twelve 
Apostles,  and  by  a  long  address  to  them  and  to  a  vast  promiscuous 
multitude,  our  Lord  would  have  retired  to  the  repose  which  such 
incessant  activity  required.  Such,  however,  was  very  far  from  being 
the  case,  and  the  next  few  days,  if  we  rightly  grasp  the  sequence  of 
events,  were  days  of  continuous  and  unwearying  toil. 

"When  the  Sermon  was  over,  the  immense  throng  dispersed  in 
various  directions,  and  those  whose  homes  lay  in  the  plain  of  Gen- 
nesareth  would  doubtless  follow  Jesus  through  the  village  of  Hattin, 
and  across  the  narrow  plateau,  and  then,  after  descending  the  ravine, 
would  leave  Magdala  on  the  right,  and  pass  through  Bethsaida  to 
Capernaum. 

As  He  descended  the  mountain,  and  was  just  entering  one  of  the 
little  towns,  probably  a  short  distance  in  advance  of  the  multitude, 
who  from  natural  respect  would  be  likely  to  leave  Him  undisturbed 
after  His  labours,  a  pitiable  spectacle  met  His  eyes.  Suddenly,  with 
agonies  of  entreaty,  falling  first  on  his  knees,  then,  in  the  anguish  of 
his  heart  and  the  intensity  of  his  supplication,  prostrating  himself 
upon  his  face,  there  appeared  before  Him,  with  bare  head,  and  rent 
garments,  and  covered  lip,  a  leper — "  full  of  leprosy" — smitten  with 
the  worst  and  foulest  form  of  that  loathsome  and  terrible  disease.  It 
must,  indeed,  have  required  on  the  pa*t  of  the  poor  wretch  a  stupen- 
dous faith  to  believe  that  the  young  Prophet  of  Nazareth  was  One  who 
could  heal  a  disease  of  which  the  worst  misery  was  the  belief  that, 
when  once  thoroughly  seated  in  the  blood,  it  was  ineradicable  and  pro- 
gressive. And  yet  the  concentrated  hope  of  a  life  broke  out  in  the 
man's  impassioned  prayer,  "  Lord,  if  Thou  wilt,  Thou  canst  make  me 
clean."  Prompt  as  an  echo  came  the  answer  to  his  faith,  "  I  will :  be  thou 
clean."  All  Christ's  miracles  are  revelations  also.  Sometimes,  when 
the  circumstances  of  the  case  required  it,  He  delayed  His  answer  to  a 
sufferer's  prayer.  But  we  are  never  told  that  there  was  a  moment's 
pause  when  a  leper  cried  to  him.  Leprosy  was  an  acknowledged  type 
of  sin,  and  Christ  would  teach  us  that  the  heartfelt  prayer  of  the  sinner 
to  be  purged  and  cleansed  is  always  met  by  instantaneous  acceptance. 
When  David,  the  type  of  all  true  penitents,  cried  with  intense  contri- 
tion, "  I  have  sinned  against  the  Lord,"  Nathan  could  instantly  convey 
to  him  God's  gracious  message,  "  The  Lord  also  hath  put  away  thy  sin; 
thou  shalt  not  die." 

Instantly  stretching  forth  His  hand,  our  Lord  touched  the  leper, 
and  he  was  cleansed. 

It  was  a  glorious  violation  of  the  letter  of  the  Law,  which  attached 


120  THE    LIFE    OF  CUBIST. 

ceremonial  pollution  to  a  leper's  touch ;  but  it  was  at  the  same  time  a 
glorious  illustration  of  the  spirit  of  the  Law,  which  was  that  mercy  is 
better  than  sacrifice.  The  hand  of  Jesus  was  not  polluted  by  touching 
the  leper's  body,  but  the  leper's  whole  body  was  cleansed  by  the  touch 
of  that  holy  hand.  It  was  even  thus  that  He  touched  our  sinful  human 
nature,  and  yet  remained  without  spot  of  sin. 

It  was  in  the  depth  and  spontaneity  of  His  human  emotion  that  our 
Lord  had  touched  the  leper  into  health.  But  it  was  His  present  desire 
to  fulfil  the  Mosaic  Law  by  perfect  obedience ;  and  both  in  proof  of 
the  miracle,  and  out  of  consideration  to  the  sufferer,  and  in  conformity 
with  the  Levitical  ordinance,  He  bade  the  leper  go  and  show  himself 
to  the  priest,  make  the  customary  offerings,  and  obtain  the  legal 
certificate  that  he  was  clean.  He  accompanied  the  direction  with 
a  strict  and  even  stern  injunction  to  say  not  one  word  of  it  to 
any  one.  It  appears  from  this  that  the  suddenness  with  which 
the  miracle  had  been  accomplished  had  kept  it  secret  from  all, 
except  perhaps  a  few  of  our  Lord's  immediate  followers,  although 
it  had  been  wrought  in  open  day,  and  in  the  immediate  neigh- 
bourhood of  a  city,  and  at  no  great  distance  from  the  following 
multitudes.  But  why  did  our  Lord  on  this,  and  many  other  occasions, 
enjoin  on  the  recipient  of  the  miracles  a  secrecy  which  they  so  rarely 
observed  ?  The  full  reason  perhaps  we  shall  never  know,  but  that  it 
had  reference  to  circumstances  of  time  and  place,  and  the  mental 
condition  of  those  in  whose  favour  the  deeds  were  wrought,  is  clear 
from  the  fact  that  on  one  occasion  at  least,  where  the  conditions  were 
different,  He  even  enjoined  a  publication  of  the  mercy  vouchsafed. 
Was  it,  as  St.  Chrysostom  conjectures,  to  repress  a  spirit  of  boast- 
fulness,  and  teach  men  not  to  talk  away  the  deep  inward  sense  of 
(rod's  great  gifts  ?  or  was  it  to  avoid  an  over-excitement  and  tumult 
in  the  already  astonished  multitudes  of  Galilee  ?  or  was  it  that  He 
might  be  regarded  by  them  m  His  true  light — not  as  a  mighty  Wonder- 
worker, not  as  a  universal  Hakim,  but  as  a  Saviour  by  Revelation  and 
by  Hope  ? 

Whatever  may  have  been  the  general  reasons,  it  appears  that  in 
this  case  there  must  have  been  some  reason  of  special  importance.  St. 
Mark,  reflecting  for  us  the  intense  and  vivid  impressions  of  St.  Peter, 
shows  us,  in  his  terse  but  most  graphic  narrative,  that  the  man's  dis- 
missal was  accompanied  on  our  Saviour's  part  with  some  overpowering 
emotion.  Not  only  is  the  word,  "He  straitly  charged  him"  (Mark 
i.  43),  a  word  implying  an  extreme  earnestness  and  even  vehemence  of 
look  and  gesture,  but  the  word  for  "forthwith  sent  him  away"  is 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  127 

literally  He  "pushed"  or  "drove  him  forth."  What  was  the  cause 
for  this  severely  inculcated  order,  for  this  instantaneous  dismissal  ? 
Perhaps  it  was  the  fact  that  by  touching  the  leper — though  the  touch 
was  healing — He  would,  in  the  eyes  of  an  unreasoning  and  unspiritual 
orthodoxy,  be  regarded  as  ceremonially  unclean.  And  that  this 
actually  did  occur  may  be  assumed  from  the  expressly  mentioned  fact 
that,  in  consequence  of  the  manner  in  which  this  incident  was  blazoned 
abroad  by  the  cleansed  sufferer,  "He  could  not  openly  enter  into  a 
city,  but  was  without  in  desert  places."  St.  Luke  mentions  a  similar 
circumstance,  though  without  giving  any  special  reason  for  it,  and 
adds  that  Jesus  spent  the  time  in  prayer.  If,  however,  the  dissemi- 
nation of  the  leper's  story  involved  the  necessity  for  a  short  period  of 
seclusion,  it  is  clear  that  the  multitude  paid  but  little  regard  to  this 
Levitical  uncleanness,  for  even  in  the  lonely  spot  to  which  Jesus  had 
retired  they  thronged  to  Him  from  every  quarter. 

Whether  the  healing  of  the  centurion's  servant  took  place  before  or 
after  this  retirment  is  uncertain;  but  from  the  fact  that  both  St. 
Matthew  and  St.  Luke  place  it  in  close  connection  with  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount,  we  may  suppose  that  the  thronging  of  the  multitudes 
to  seek  Him,  even  in  desert  places,  may  have  shown  him  that  it  would 
not  bo  possible  for  Him  to  satisfy  the  scruples  of  the  Legalists  by 
this  temporary  retirement  from  human  intercourse. 

Our  Lord  had  barely  reached  the  town  of  Capernaum,  where  He 
had  fixed  His  temporary  home,  when  He  was  met  by  a  deputation 
of  Jewish  elders — probably  the  Itatlanwn  of  the  chief  synagogue — to 
intercede  with  Him  on  behalf  of  a  centurion,  whose  faithful  and 
beloved  slave  lay  in  the  agony  and  peril  of  a  paralytic  seizure.  It 
might  have  seemed  strange  that  Jewish  elders  should  take  this  amount 
of  interest  in  one  who,  whether  a  Roman  or  not,  was  certainly  a 
heathen,  and  may  not  even  have  been  a  "proselyte  of  the  gate." 
They  explained,  however,  that  not  only  did  he  love  their  nation — a 
thing  most  rare  in  a  Gentile,  for,  generally  speaking,  the  Jews  were 
regarded  with  singular  detestation — but  had  even,  at  his  own  expense, 
built  them  a  synagogue,  which,  although  there  must  have  been  several 
in  Capernaum,  was  sufficiently  beautiful  and  conspicuous  to  be  called 
"  the  synagogue."  The  mere  fa'ct  of  their  appealing  to  Jesus  shows 
that  this  event  belongs  to  an  early  period  of  His  ministry,  when 
myriads  looked  to  him  with  astonishment  and  hope,  and  before  the 
deadly  exasperation  of  after  days  had  begun.  Christ  immediately 
granted  their  request.  "  I  will  go,"  he  said,  "  and  heal  him."  But  on 
the  way  they  met  other  messengers  from  the  humble  and  devout 


128  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

centurion,  entreating  Him  not  to  enter  the  unworthy  roof  of  a  Gentile, 
but  to  heal  the  suffering  slave  (as  He  had  healed  the  son  of  a  courtier) 
by  a  mere  word  of  power.  As  the  centurion,  though  in  a  subordinate 
office,  yet  had  ministers  ever  ready  to  do  his  bidding,  so  could  not 
Christ  bid  viewless  messengers  to  perform  His  will,  without  under- 
going this  personal  labour  ?  The  Lord  was  struck  by  so  remarkable 
a  faith,  greater  than  any  which  He  had  met  with  even  in  Israel.  He 
had  found  in  the  oleaster  what  He  had  not  found  in  the  olive ;  and 
He  drew  from  this  circumstance  the  lesson,  which  fell  with  such  a 
chilling  and  unwelcome  sound  on  Jewish  ears,  that  when  many  of  the 
natural  children  of  the  kingdom  should  be  cast  into  outer  darkness, 
many  should  come  from  the  East  and  the  West,  and  sit  down  with 
Abraham  and  Isaac  and  Jacob  in  the  kingdom  of  heaven.  But  the 
centurion's  messengers  found  on  their  return  that  the  healing  word 
had  been  effectual,  and  that  the  cherished  slave  had  been  restored  to 
health. 

It  is  not  strange  that,  after  days  as  marvellous  as  these,  it  was 
impossible  for  Jesus  to  find  due  repose.  From  early  dawn  on  the 
mountain-top  to  late  evening  in  whatever  house  He  had  selected  for 
His  nightly  rest,  the  multitudes  came  crowding  about  Him,  not 
respecting  His  privacy,  not  allowing  for  His  weariness,  eager  to  see 
Him,  eager  to  share  His  miracles,  eager  to  listen  to  His  words.  There 
was  no  time  even  to  eat  bread.  Such  a  life  is  not  only  to  the  last 
degree  trying  and  fatiguing,  but  to  a  refined  and  high-strung  nature, 
rejoicing  in  noble  solitude,  finding  its  purest  and  most  perfect  happi- 
ness in  lonely  prayer,  this  incessant  publicity,  this  apparently  illimit- 
able toil  becomes  simply  maddening,  unless  the  spirit  be  sustained  by 
boundless  sympathy  and  love.  But  the  heart  of  the  Saviour  tuas  so 
sustained.  It  is  probably  to  this  period  that  the  remarkable  anecdote 
belongs  which  is  preserved  for  us  by  St.  Mark  alone.  The  kinsmen 
and  immediate  family  of  Christ,  hearing  of  all  that  He  was  doing,  came 
from  their  home — perhaps  at  Cana,  perhaps  at  Capernaum — to  get 
possession  of  His  person,  to  put  Him  under  constraint.  Their  infor- 
mants had  mistaken  the  exaltation  visible  in  all  His  words  and  actions — 
the  intense  glow  of  compassion — the  burningflame  of  love ;  they  looked 
upon  it  as  over-excitement,  exaggerated  sensibility,  the  very  delirium 
of  beneficence  and  zeal.  To  the  world  there  has  ever  been  a  tendency 
to  confuse  the  fervour  of  enthusiam  with  the  eccentricity  of  a  dis- 
ordered genius.  "  Paul,  thou  art  mad,"  was  the  only  comment  which 
the  Apostle's  passion  of  exalted  eloquence  produced  on  the  cynical  and 
blase  intellect  of  the  Roman  Procurator.  "  He  hath  a  devil,"  was  the 


TUB   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  129 

inference  suggested  to  many  dull  and  worldly  hearers  after  some  of  the 
tenderest  and  divinest  sayings  of  our  Lord.  "  Brother  Martin  has  a  fine 
genius,"  was  the  sneering  allusion  of  Pope  Leo  X.  to  Luther.  "  What 
crackbrained  fanatics,"  observed  the  fine  gentlemen  of  the  eighteenth 
century  when  they  spoke  of  Wesley  and  Whitefield.  Similar,  though 
not  so  coarse,  was  the  thought  which  filled  the  mind  of  Christ's  won- 
dering relatives,  when  they  heard  of  this  sudden  and  amazing  activity, 
after  the  calm  seclusion  of  thirty  unknown  and  unnoticed  years.  As 
yet  they  were  out  of  sympathy  with  Him  ;  they  knew  him  not,  did  not 
fully  believe  in  Him ;  they  said,  "  He  is  beside  Himself."  It  was 
needful  that  they  should  be  henceforth  taught  by  several  decisive 
proofs  that  He  was  not  of  them ;  that  this  was  no  longer  the 
Carpenter,  the  brother  of  James  and  Joses  and  Judas  and  Simon, 
but  the  Son  of  God,  the  Saviour  of  the  world. 


CHAPTER   XX. 

JESUS   AT  NAIN. 

IF  the  common  reading  in  the  text  of  St.  Luke  (vii.  11)  be  right,  it 
was  on  the  very  day  after  these  events  that  our  Lord  took  His  way 
from  Capernaum  to  Nain.  Possibly — for,  in  the  dim  uncertainties  of 
the  chronological  sequence,  much  scope  must  be  left  to  pure  conjecture 
— the  incident  of  His  having  touched  the  leper  may  have  tended  to 
hasten  His  temporary  departure  from  Capernaum  by  the  comments 
which  the  act  involved. 

Nain — now  a  squalid  and  miserable  village — is  about  twenty-five 
miles  from  Capernaum,  and  lies  on  the  north-west  slope  of  Jebel 
el-Duhy,  or  Little  Hermon.  The  name  (which  it  still  retains)  means 
"  fair,"  and  its  situation  near  Endor — nestling  picturesquely  on  the 
hill-slopes  of  the  graceful  mountain,  and  full  in  view  of  Tabor  and 
the  heights  of  Zebulon — justifies  the  nattering  title.  Starting,  as 
Orientals  always  do,  early  in  the  cool  morning  hours,  Jesus,  in  all 
probability,  sailed  to  the  southern  end  of  the  lake,  and  then  passed 
down  the  Jordan  valley,  to  the  spot  where  the  wadies  of  the  Esdraelon 
slope  down  to  it ;  from  which  point,  leaving  Mount  Tabor  on  the  right 


130  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

hand,  and  Endor  on  the  left,  He  might  easily  have  arrived  at  the 
little  village  soon  after  noon. 

At  this  bright  and  welcome  period  of  His  ministry,  He  was  usually 
accompanied,  not  only  by  His  disciples,  but  also  by  rejoicing  and 
adoring  crowds.  And  as  this  glad  procession,  so  full  of  their  high 
hopes  and  too-often-erring  beliefs  about  the  coming  King,  was 
climbing  the  narrow  and  rocky  ascent  which  leads  to  the  gate  of 
Nain,  they  were  met  by  another  and  a  sad  procession  issuing  through 
it  to  bury  a  dead  youth  outside  the  walls.  There  was  a  pathos  deeper 
than  ordinary  in  the  spectacle,  and  therefore  probably,  in  that 
emotional  race,  a  wail  wilder  and  sincerer  than  the  ordinary  lamenta- 
tion. For  this  boy  was — in  language  which  is  all  the  more  deeply 
moving  from  its  absolute  simplicity,  and  which  to  Jewish  ears  would 
have  involved  a  sense  of  anguish  yet  deeper  than  to  ours — "  the  only 
son  of  his  mother,  and  she  a  widow/'  The  sight  of  this  terrible 
sorrow  appealed  irresistibly  to  the  Saviour's  loving  and  gentle  heart. 
Pausing  only  to  say  to  the  mother,  "Weep  not,"  He  approached,  and 
— heedless  once  more  of  purely  ceremonial  observances — touched  the 
bier,  or  rather  the  open  coffin  in  which  the  dead  youth  lay.  It  must 
have  been  a  moment  of  intense  and  breathless  expectation.  Unbidden, 
but  filled  with  undefinable  awe,  the  bearers  of  the  bier  stood  still. 
And  then  through  the  hearts  of  the  stricken  mourners,  and  through 
the  hearts  of  the  silent  multitude,  there  thrilled  the  calm  utterance, 
"  Young  man,  arise  !  "  Would  that  dread  monosyllable  thrill  also 
through  the  unknown  mysterious  solitudes  of  death  ?  would  it  thrill 
through  the  impenetrable  darkness  of  the  more-than-midnight  which 
has  ever  concealed  from  human  vision  the  world  beyond  the  grave  ? 
It  did.  The  dead  got  up,  and  began  to  speak ;  and  He  delivered  him 
to  his  mother. 

No  wonder  that  a  great  fear  fell  upon  all.  They  might  have 
thought  of  Elijah  and  the  widow  of  Sarepta ;  of  Elisha  and  the  lady 
of  the  not  far  distant  Shunem.  They  too,  the  greatest  of  the  Prophets, 
had  restored  to  lonely  women  their  dead  only  sons.  But  they  had 
done  it  with  agonies  and  energies  of  supplication,  wrestling  in  prayer, 
and  lying  outstretched  upon  the  dead  ;  whereas  Jesus  had  wrought 
that  miracle  calmly,  incidentally,  instantaneously,  in  His  own  name, 
by  His  own  authority,  with  a  single  word.  Could  they  judge  otherwise 
than  that  "  God  had  visited  His  people  ?  " 

It  was  about  this  time,  possibly  even  on  this  same  day,  that  our 
Lord  received  a  short  but  agitated  message  from  His  own  great 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  131 

Forerunner,  John  the  Baptist.  Its  very  brevity  added  to  the  sense 
of  doubt  and  sadness  which  it  breathed.  "  Art  thou,"  he  asked, 
"  the  coming  Messiah,  or  are  we  to  expect  another  ?  " 

Was  this  a  message  from  him  who  had  first  recognised  and  pointed 
out  the  Lamb  of  God  ?  from  him  who,  in  the  rapture  of  vision,  had 
seen  heaven  opened  and  the  Spirit  descending  on  the  head  of  Jesus 
like  a  dove  ? 

It  may  be  so.  Some  have  indeed  imagined  that  the  message  was 
merely  intended  to  satisfy  the  doubts  of  the  Baptist's  jealous  and 
disheartened  followers;  some,  that  his  question  only  meant,  "Art 
Thou  indeed  the  Jesus  to  whom  I  bore  my  testimony  ?  "  some,  that 
the  message  implied  no  latent  hesitation,  but  was  intended  as  a  timid 
suggestion  that  the  time  was  now  come  for  Jesus  to  manifest  Himself 
as  the  Messiah  of  His  nation's  theocratic  hopes — perhaps  even  as  a 
gentle  rebuke  to  Him  for  allowing  His  friend  and  Forerunner  to 
languish  in  a  dungeon,  and  not  exerting  on  his  behalf  the  miraculous 
power  of  which  these  rumours  told.  But  these  suggestions — all 
intended,  as  it  were,  to  save  the  credit  of  the  Baptist — are  at  the  best 
wholly  unauthorised,  and  are  partly  refuted  by  the  actual  expressions 
of  the  narrative.  St.  John  Baptist  in  his  heroic  greatness  needs  not 
the  poor  aid  of  our  charitable  suppositions :  we  conclude  from  the 
express  words  of  Him,  who  at  this  very  crisis  pronounced  upon  him 
the  most  splendid  eulogy  ever  breathed  over  mortal  man,  that  the 
great  and  noble  prophet  had  indeed,  for  the  moment,  found  a 
stumbling-block  to  his  faith  in  what  he  heard  about  the  Christ. 

And  is  this  unnatural  ?  is  it  an  indecision  which  any  one  who 
knows  anything  of  the  human  heart  will  venture  for  a  moment  to 
condemn  ?  The  course  of  the  greatest  of  the  Prophets  had  been  brief 
and  tragical — a  sad  calendar  of  disaster  and  eclipse.  Though  all  men 
flocked  in  multitudes  to  listen  to  the  fiery  preacher  of  the  wilderness, 
the  real  effect  on  the  mind  of  the  nation  had  been  neither  permanent 
nor  deep.  We  may  say  with  the  Scotch  poet — 

"  Who  listened  to  hie  voice  ?  obeyed  bis  cry  P 
Only  the  echoes  which  he  made  relent 
Bong  from  their  flinty  caves,  '  Repent !  repent ! ' " 

Even  before  Jesus  had  come  forth  in  the  fulness  of  His  ministry,  the 
power  and  influence  of  John  had  paled  like  a  star  before  the  sunrise. 
He  must  have  felt  very  soon — and  that  is  a  very  bitter  thing  for  any 
human  heart  to  feel — that  his  mission  for  this  life  was  over ;  that 

K  2 


132  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

nothing  appreciable  remained  for  him  to  do.  Similar  momenta  of 
intense  and  heart-breaking  despondency  had  already  occurred  in  the 
lives  of  his  very  greatest  predecessors — in  the  lives  of  even  a  Moses 
and  an  Elijah.  But  the  case  was  far  worse  with  John  the  Baptist  than 
with  them.  For  though  his  Friend  and  his  Saviour  was  living,  was  at 
no  great  distance  from  him,  was  in  the  full  tide  of  His  influence,  and 
was  daily  working  the  miracles  of  love  which  attested  His  mission,  yet 
John  saw  that  Friend  and  Saviour  on  earth  no  more.  There  were  no 
visits  to  console,  no  intercourse  to  sustain  him;  he  was  surrounded 
only  by  the  coldness  of  listeners  whose  curiosity  had  waned,  and  the 
jealousy  of 'disciples  whom  his  main  testimony  had  disheartened.  And 
then  came  the  miserable  climax.  Herod  Antipas — the  pettiest,  meanest, 
weakest,  most  contemptible  of  titular  princelings — partly  influenced 
by  political  fears,  partly  enraged  by  John's  just  and  blunt  rebuke  of 
his  adulterous  life,  though  at  first  he  had  listened  to  the  Baptist  with 
the  superstition  which  is  the  usual  concomitant  of  cunning,  had  ended 
by  an  uxorious  concession  to  the  hatred  of  Herodias,  and  had  flung 
him  into  prison. 

Josephus  tells  us  that  this  prison  was  the  fortress  of  Machserus,  or 
Makor,  a  strong  and  gloomy  castle,  built  by  Alexander  Jannaeus  and 
strengthened  by  Herod  the  Great — on  the  borders  of  the  desert,  to  the 
north  of  the  Dead  Sea,  and  on  the  frontiers  of  Arabia.  We  know 
enough  of  solitary  castles  and  Eastern  dungeons  to  realise  what 
horrors  must  have  been  involved  for  any  man  in  such  an  imprison- 
ment; what  possibilities  of  agonising  torture,  what  daily  risk  of  a 
violent  and  unknown  death.  How  often  in  the  world's  history  have 
even  the  most  generous  and  dauntless  spirits  been  crushed  and  effemi- 
nated by  such  hopeless  captivity !  When  the  first  noble  rage,  or  heroic 
resignation,  is  over — when  the  iron-hearted  endurance  is  corroded  by 
forced  inactivity  and  maddening  solitude — when  the  great  heart  is 
cowed  by  the  physical  lassitude  and  despair  of  a  life  left  to  rot  away 
in  the  lonely  darkness — who  can  be  answerable  for  the  level  of  depres- 
sion to  which  he  may  sink  ?  Savonarola,  and  Jerome  of  Prague,  and 
Luther  were  men  whose  courage,  like  that  of  the  Baptist,  had  enabled 
them  to  stand  unquailing  before  angry  councils  and  threatening  kings: 
will  any  one,  in  forming  an  estimate' of  their  goodness  and  their  great- 
ness, add  one  shade  of  condemnation  because  of  the  wavering  of  the 
first  and  of  the  second  in  the  prison-cells  of  Florence  aud  Constance,  or 
the  phantasies  of  incipient  madness  which  agitated,  in  the  castle  of 
Wartbtirg,  the  ardent  spirit  of  the  third  ?  And  yet  to  St.  John  Baptist 


TUB   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  133 

imprisonment  must  have  been  a  deadlier  thing  than  even  to  Luther ; 
for  in  the  free  wild  life  of  the  hermit  he  had  lived  in  constant  com- 
munion with  the  sights  and  sounds  of  nature,  had  breathed  with 
delight  and  liberty  the  free  winds  of  the  wilderness,  and  gazed  with  a 
sense  of  companionship  on  the  large  stars  which  beam  from  the  clear 
vault  of  the  Eastern  night.  To  a  child  of  freedom  and  of  passion,  to 
a  rugged,  passionate,  untamed  spirit  like  that  of  John,  a  prison  was 
worse  than  death.  For  the  palms  of  Jericho  and  the  balsams  of 
Engedi,  for  the  springing  of  the  beautiful  gazelles  amid  the  mountain 
solitudes,  and  the  reflection  of  the  moonlight  on  the  mysterious  waves 
of  the  Salt  Lake,  he  had  nothing  now  but  the  chilly  damps  and  cramp- 
ing fetters  of  a  dungeon,  and  the  brutalities  of  such  a  jailor  as  a 
tetrarch  like  Antipas  would  have  kept  in  a  fortress  like  Makor.  In 
that  black  prison,  among  its  lava  streams  and  basaltic  rocks,  which 
was  tenanted  in  reality  by  far  worse  demons  of  human  brutality  and 
human  vice  than  the  "  goats  "  and  "  satyrs "  and  doleful  creatures 
believed  by  Jewish  legend  to  haunt  its  whole  environment,  we  cannot 
wonder  if  the  eye  of  the  caged  eagle  began  to  film. 

Not  once  or  twice  alone  in  the  world's  history  has  God  seemed  to 
make  His  very  best  and  greatest  servants  drink  to  the  very  dregs 
the  cup  of  apparent  failure — called  them  suddenly  away  by  the  sharp 
stroke  of  martyrdom,  or  down  the  long  declivities  of  a  lingering  disease, 
before  even  a  distant  view  of  their  work  has  been  vouchsafed  to  them ; 
flung  them,  as  it  were,  aside  like  broken  instruments,  useless  for  their 
destined  purpose,  ere  He  crowned  with  an  immortality  of  success  and 
blessing  the  lives  which  fools  regarded  as  madness,  and  the  end  that 
has  been  without  human  honour.  It  is  but  a  part  of  that  merciful  fire 
in  which  He  is  purging  away  the  dross  from  the  seven-times-refined 
gold  of  a  spirit  which  shall  be  worthy  of  eternal  bliss.  But  to  none 
could  this  disciplinary  tenderness  have  come  in  more  terrible  disguise 
than  to  St.  John.  For  he  seemed  to  be  neglected  not  only  by  God 
above,  but  by  the  living  Son  of  God  on  earth.  John  was  pining  in 
Herod's  prison  while  Jesus,  in  the  glad  simplicity  of  His  early  Galilaean  , 
ministry,  was  preaching  to  rejoicing  multitudes  among  the  mountain  N 
lilies  or  from  the  waves  of  the  pleasant  lake.  Oh,  why  did  his  Father 
in  heaven  and  his  Friend  on  earth  suffer  him  to  languish  in  this  soul- 
clouding  misery  ?  Had  not  his  life  been  innocent  ?  had  not  his 
ministry  been  faithful  ?  had  not  his  testimony  been  true  ?  Oh,  why 
did  not  He,  to  whom  he  had  borne  witness  beyond  Jordan,  call  down 
fire  from  heaven  to  shatter  those  foul  and  guilty  towers  ?  Among  so 


134  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

many  miracles  might  not  one  be  spared  to  the  unhappy  kinsman  who 
had  gone  before  His  face  to  prepare  his  way  before  Him  ?  Among  so 
many  words  of  mercy  and  tenderness  might  not  some  be  vouchsafed  to 
him  who  had  uttered  that  Voice  in  the  wilderness  ?  Why  should  not 
the  young  Son  of  David  rock  with  earthquake  the  foundations  of  these 
Idumaean  prisons,  where  many  a  noble  captive  had  been  unjustly  slain, 
or  send  but  one  of  His  twelve  legions  of  angels  to  liberate  His  fore- 
runner and  His  friend,  were  it  but  to  restore  him  to  his  desert  solitude 
once  more — content  there  to  end  his  life  among  the  wild  beasts,  so  it 
were  far  from  man's  tyrannous  infamy,  and  under  God's  open  sky  ? 
What  wonder,  we  say  again,  if  the  eye  of  the  caged  eagle  began 
to  film! 

"  Art  thou  he  that  should  come,  or  do  we  look  for  another  ?  " 
Jesus  did  not  directly  answer  the  question.  He  showed  the  mes- 
sengers, He  let  them  see  with  their  own  eyes,  some  of  the  works  of  which 
hitherto  they  had  only  heard  by  the  hearing  of  the  ear.  And  then, 
with  a  reference  to  the  61st  chapter  of  Isaiah,  He  bade  them  take  back 
to  their  master  the  message,  that  blind  men  saw,  and  lame  walked, 
and  lepers  were  cleansed,  and  deaf  heard,  and  dead  were  raised ;  and 
above  all,  and  more  than  all,  that  to  the  poor  the  glad  tidings  were 
being  preached  :  and  then,  we  can  imagine  with  how  deep  a  tenderness, 
He  added,  "  And  blessed  is  he  whosoever  shall  not  be  offended  in 
Me  " — blessed  (that  is)  is  he  who  shall  trust  Me,  even  in  spite  of 
sorrow  and  persecution — he  who  shall  believe  that  I  know  to  the 
utmost  the  will  of  Him  that  sent  Me,  and  how  and  when  to  finish 
His  work. 

We  may  easily  suppose,  though  nothing  more  is  told  us,  that  the 
disciples  did  not  depart  without  receiving  from  Jesus  other  words  of 
private  affection  and  encouragement  for  the  grand  prisoner  whose  end 
was  now  so  nearly  approaching — words  which  would  be  to  him  sweeter 
than  the  honey  which  had  sustained  his  hunger  in  the  wilderness, 
dearer  than  water-springs  in  the  dry  ground.  And  no  sooner  had  the 
disciples  departed,  than  He  who  would  not  seem  to  be  guilty  of  idle 
flattery,  but  yet  wished  to  prevent  His  hearers  from  cherishing  one  depre- 
ciatory thought  of  the  great  Prophet  of  the  Desert,  uttered  over  His 
friend  and  Forerunner,  in  language  of  rhythmic  and  perfect  loveliness, 
the  memorable  eulogy,  that  he  was  indeed  the  promised  Voice  in  the 
new  dawn  of  a  nobler  day,  the  greatest  of  all  God's  herald  messengers 
— the  Elias  who,  according  to  the  last  word  of  ancient  prophecy,  was 
to  precede  the  Advent  of  the  Messiah,  and  to  prepare  His  way. 


I11E    LIVE    OF   CHRIST.  135 

"  What  went  you  out  in  the  wilderness  for  to  sec  ? 

"  A  reed  shaken  by  the  wind  ? 

"  But  what  went  ye  out  for  to  see  ? 

"  A  man  clothed  in  soft  raiment  ? 

"  Behold,  they  that  wear  soft  clothing  are  in  kings'  houses ! 

"But  what  went  ye  out  for  to  see  ? 

"  A  prophet  ? 

"  Yea,  I  say  unto  you,  and  far  more  than  a  prophet.  For  this  is 
he  of  whom  it  is  written,  Behold,  I  send  My  messenger  before  Thy 
face,  who  shall  prepare  Thy  way  before  Thee." 

And  having  pronounced  this  rhythmic  and  impassioned  eulogy,  He 
proceeded  to  speak  to  them  more  calmly  respecting  Himself  and  John, 
and  to  tell  them  that  though  John  was  the  last  and  the  greatest  of  the 
Old  Dispensation,  yet  the  least  in  the  kingdom  of  heaven  was  greater 
than  he.  The  brevity  with  which  the  words  are  repeated  leaves  their 
meaning  uncertain ;  but  the  superiority  intended  is  a  superiority  doubt- 
less in  spiritual  privileges,  not  in  moral  exaltation.  "  The  least  of 
that  which  is  greatest,"  says  a  legal  maxim,  "  is  greater  than  the 
greatest  of  that  which  is  least;"  and  in  revealed  knowledge,  in 
illimitable  hope,  in  conscious  closeness  of  relationship  to  His  Father 
and  His  God,  the  humblest  child  of  the  New  Covenant  is  more  richly 
endowed  than  the  greatest  prophet  of  the  Old.  And  into  that  king- 
dom of  God  whose  advent  was  now  proclaimed,  henceforth  with  holy 
and  happy  violence  they  all  might  press.  Such  eager  violence — 
natural  to  those  who  hunger  and  thirst  after  righteousness — would  be 
only  acceptable  in  the  sight  of  God. 

Many  who  heard  these  words,  and  especially  the  publicans  and 
those  who  were  scorned  as  the  "  people  of  the  earth,"  accepted  with 
joy  and  gratitude  this  approbation  of  their  confidence  in  John.  But 
there  were  others — the  accredited  teachers  of  the  written  and  oral 
Law — who  listened  to  such  words  with  contemptuous  dislike.  Struck 
with  these  contrasts,  Jesus  drew  an  illustration  from  peevish  children 
who  fretfully  reject  every  effort  of  their  fellows  to  delight  or  to  amuse 
them.  Nothing  could  please  such  soured  and  rebellious  natures. 
The  flute  and  dance  of  the  little  ones  who  played  at  weddings  charmed 
them  as  little  as  the  long  wail  of  the  simulated  funeral.  God's 
"  richly-variegated  wisdom  "  had  been  exhibited  to  them  in  many 
fragments,  and  by  many  methods,  yet  all  in  vain.  John  had  come  to 
them  in  the  stern  asceticism  of  the  hermit,  and  they  called  him  mad ; 
Jesus  joined  in  the  banquet  and  the  marriage-feast,  and  they  called 


136  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

/  Him  "  an  eater  and  a  -wine-drinker."  Even  so  !  yet  Wisdom  has  been 
s  ever  justified  at  her  children's  hands.  Those  children  have  not  dis- 
'  graced  their  divine  original.  Fools  might  account  their  life  as  mad- 
,  ness,  and  their  end  to  be  without  honour ;  bnt  how  is  the  very 

humblest  of  them  numbered  among  the  children  of  God,  and  their  lot 

among  the  saints ! 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

THE    SFNNER  AND   THE    PHARISEE. 

BUT  not  even  yet  apparently  were  the  deeds  and  sayings  of  this 
memorable  day  concluded ;  for  in  the  narrative  of  St.  Luke  it  seems  to 
have  been  on  the  same  day  that,  perhaps  at  Nain,  perhaps  at  Magdala, 
Jesus  received  and  accepted  an  invitation  from  one  of  the  Pharisees 
who  bore  the  very  common  name  of  Simon. 

The  cause  or  object  of  the  invitation  we  do  not  know ;  but  as  yet 
Jesus  had  come  to  no  marked  or  open  rupture  with  the  Pharisaic 
party,  and  they  may  even  have  imagined  that  He  might  prove  of  use 
to  them  as  the  docile  instrument  of  their  political  and  social  purposes. 
Probably,  in  inviting  him,  Simon  was  influenced  partly  by  curiosity, 
partly  by  the  desire  to  receive  a  popular  and  distinguished  teacher, 
partly  by  willingness  to  show  a  distant  approval  of  something  which 
may  have  struck  him  in  Christ's  looks,  or  words,  or  ways.  It  is  quite 
clear  that  the  hospitality  was  meant  to  be  qualified  and  condescend- 
ing. All  the  ordinary  attentions  which  would  have  been  paid  to  an 
honoured  guest  were  coldly  and  cautiously  omitted.  There  was  no 
water  for  the  weary  and  dusty  feet,  no  kiss  of  welcome  upon  the 
cheek,  no  perfume  for  the  hair,  nothing  bnt  a  somewhat  ungracious 
admission  to  a  vacant  place  at  the  table,  and  the  most  distant  cour- 
tesies of  ordinary  intercourse,  so  managed  that  the  Guest  might  feel 
that  he  was  supposed  to  be  receiving  an  honour,  and  not  to  be  con- 
ferring one. 

In  order  that  the  mats  or  carpets  which  are  hallowed  by  domestic 
prayer  may  not  be  rendered  unclean  by  any  pollution  of  the  streets, 
each  guest,  as  he  enters  a  house  in  Syria  or  Palestine,  takes  off  his 


T11E   LIKE    OF   C1IR1ST.  137 

sandals,  and  leaves  them  at  the  door.  He  then  proceeds  to  his  place 
at  the  table.  In  ancient  times,  as  we  find  throughout  the  Old  Testa- 
ment, it  was  the  custom  of  the  Jews  to  eat  their  meals  sitting  cross- 
legged — as  ia  still  common  throughout  the  East — in  front  of  a  tray 
placed  on  a  low  stool,  on  which  is  set  the  dish  containing  the  heap  of 
food,  from  which  all  help  themselves  in  common.  But  this  custom, 
though  it  has  been  resumed  for  centuries,  appears  to  have  been  aban- 
doned by  the  Jews  in  the  period  succeeding  the  Captivity.  Whether 
they  had  borrowed  the  recumbent  posture  at  meals  from  the  Persians 
or  not,  it  is  certain,  from  the  expressions  employed,  that  in  the  time 
of  our  Lord  the  Jews,  like  the  Greeks  and  Romans,  reclined  at  ban- 
quets, upon  couches  placed  round  tables  of  much  the  same  height  as 
those  now  in  use.  We  shall  see  hereafter  that  even  the  Passover  was 
eaten  in  this  attitude.  The  beautiful  and  profoundly  moving  incident 
which  occurred  in  Simon's  house  can  only  be  understood  by  remem- 
bering that  as  the  guests  lay  on  the  couches  which  surrounded  the 
tables,  their  feet  would  be  turned  towards  any  spectators  who  were 
standing  outside  the  circle  of  bidden  guests. 

An  Oriental's  house  is  by  no  means  his  castle.  The  universal 
prevalence  of  the  law  of  hospitality — the  very  first  of  Eastern  virtues 
— almost  forces  him  to  live  with  open  doors,  and  any  one  may  at  any 
time  have  access  to  his  rooms.  But  on  this  occasion  there  was  one  who 
had  summoned  up  courage  to  intrude  upon  that  respectable  dwelling- 
place  a  presence  which  was  not  only  nnwelcome,  but  positively  odious. 
A  poor,  stained,  fallen  woman,  notorious  in  the  place  for  her  evil  life, 
discovering  that  Jesus  was  supping  in  the  house  of  the  Pharisee, 
ventured  to  make  her  way  there  among  the  throng  of  other  visitants, 
carrying  with  her  an  alabaster  box  of  spikenard.  She  found  the 
object  of  her  search,  and  as  she  stood  humbly  behind  Him,  and  listened 
to  His  words,  and  thought  of  all  that  He  was,  and  all  to  which  she 
had  fallen — thought  of  the  stainless,  sinless  purity  of  the  holy  and 
youthful  Prophet,  and  of  her  own  shameful  degraded  life — she  began 
to  weep,  and  her  tears  dropped  fast  upon  His  nnsandalled  feet,  over 
which  she  bent  lower  and  lower  to  hide  her  confusion  and  her  shame. 
The  Pharisee  would  have  started  back  with  horror  from  the  touch, 
still  more  from  the  tear,  of  such  an  one ;  he  would  have  wiped  away 
the  fancied  pollution,  and  driven  off  the  presumptuous  intruder  with  a 
curse.  But  this  woman  felt  instinctively  that  Jesus  would  not  treat 
her  so;  she  felt  that  the_  highest  sinlessness  is  also,  the  ^deepest  V ^ 
sympathy ;  she  saw  that  where  the  hard  respectability  of  her  fellow-  ' 


138  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

sinner  would  repel,  the  perfect  holiness  of  her  Saviour  would  receive. 
Perhaps  she  had  heard  those  infinitely  tender  and  gracious  words 
which  may  have  been  uttered  on  this  very  day — "  Come  unto  me,  all 
ye  that  labour  and  are  heavy  laden,  and  I  will  give  you  rest."  And 
she  was  emboldened  by  being  unreproved ;  and  thus  becoming  conscious 
that,  whatever  others  might  do,  the  Lord  at  any  rate  did  not  loathe  or 
scorn  her,  she  drew  yet  nearer  to  Him,  and,  sinking  down  upon  her 
knees,  began  with  her  long  dishevelled  hair  to  wipe  the  feet  which 
had  been  wetted  with  her  tears,  and  then  to  cover  them  with  kisses, 
and  at  last — breaking  the  alabaster  vase — to  bathe  them  with  the 
precious  and  fragrant  nard. 

The  sight  of  that  dishevelled  woman,  the  shame  of  her  humiliation, 
the  agonies  of  her  penitence,  the  quick  dropping  of  her  tears,  the 
sacrifice  of  that  perfume  wjiich  had  been  one  of  the  instruments  of  her 
unhallowed  arts,  might  have  touched  even  the  stoniest  feeling8~into  an 
emotion  of  sympathy.  But  Simon,  the  Pharisee,  looked  on  with  icy 
dislike  and  disapproval.  The  irresistible  appeal  to  pity  of  that 
despairing  and  broken-hearted  mourner  did  not  move  him.  It  was 
not  enough  for  him  that  Jesus  had  but  suffered  the  unhappy  creature 
to  kiss  and  anoint  His  feet,  without  speaking  to  her  as  yet  one 
word  of  encouragement.  Had  he  been  a  prophet,  He  ought  to  have 
known  what  kind  of  woman  she  was ;  and  had  He  known,  He  ought 
to  have  repulsed  her  with  contempt  and  indignation,  as  Simon  would 
himself  have  done.  Her  mere  touch  almost  involved  the  necessity  of  a 
ceremonial  quarantine.  One  sign  from  Him,  and  Simon  would  have 
been  only  too  glad  of  an  excuse  for  ejecting  such  a  pollution  from  the 
shelter  of  his  roof. 

The  Pharisee  did  not  utter  these  thoughts  aloud,  but  his  frigid 
demeanour,  and  the  contemptuous  expression  of  countenance,  which  he 
did  not  take  the  trouble  to  disguise,  showed  all  that  was  passing  in  his 
heart.  Our  Lord  heard  his  thoughts,  but  did  not  at  once  reprove  and 
expose  his  cold  uncharity  and  unrelenting  hardness.  In  order  to  call 
general  attention  to  his  words,  he  addressed  his  host. 

"  Simon,  I  have  something  to  say  to  thee." 

"  Master,  say  on,"  is  the  somewhat  constrained  reply. 

"  There  was  a  certain  creditor  who  had  two  debtors :  the  one  owed 
five  hundred  pence,  and  the  other  fifty ;  and  when  they  had  nothing 
to  pay,  he  freely  forgave  them  both.  Tell  me  then,  which  of  them 
will  love  him  most  ?  " 

Simon  does  not  seem  to  have  had  the  slightest  conception  that  the 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHEIST.  139 

question  had  any  reference  to  himself — as  little  conception  as  David 
had  when  he  pronounced  so  frank  a  judgment  on  Nathan's  parable. 

"  I  imagine,"  he  said — there  is  a  touch  of  supercilious  patronage, 
of  surprised  indifference  to  the  whole  matter  in  the  word  he  uses — "  I 
presume  that  he  to  whom  he  forgave  most." 

"  Thou  hast  rightly  judged."  And  then — the  sterner  for  its  very 
gentleness  and  forbearance — came  the  moral  and  application  of  the 
little  tale,  couched  in  that  rhythmic  utterance  of  antithetic  parallelism 
which  our  Lord  often  adopted  in  His  loftier  teaching,  and  which 
appealed  like  the  poetry  of  their  own  prophets  to  the  eara  of  those 
who  heard  it.  Though  Simon  may  not  have  seen  the  point  of  the 
parable,  perhaps  the  penitent,  with  the  quicker  intuition  of  a  contrite 
heart,  had  seen  it.  But  what  must  have  been  her  emotion  when  He 
who  hitherto  had  not  noticed  her,  now  turned  full  towards  her,  and 
calling  the  attention  of  all  who  were  present  to  her  shrinking  figure, 
as  she  sat  upon  the  ground,  hiding  with  her  two  hands  and  with  her 
dishevelled  hair  the  confusion  of  her  face,  exclaimed  to  the  astonished 
Pharisee — 

"  Simon  !  dost  thou  mark  this  woman  ? 

"  I  was  thine  own  guest :  thou  pouredst  no  water  over  my  feet ; 
but  she,  with  her  tears,  washed  my  feet,  and  with  her  hair  she  wiped 
them. 

"  No  kiss  gavest  thou  to  Me ;  but  she,  since  the  time  I  came  in, 
has  been  ceaselessly  covering  my  feet  with  kisses. 

"  My  head  with  oil  thou  anointodst  not ;  but  she  with  spikenard 
anointed  my  feet. 

"Wherefore  I  say  to  you,  her  sins — her  many  sins,  have  been 
forgiven ;  but  he  to  whom  there  is  but  little  forgiveness,  loveth 
little." 

And  then,  like  the  rich  close  of  gracious  music,  he  added,  no 
longer  to  Simon,  but  to  the  poor  sinful  woman,  the  words  of  mercy, 
"  Thy  sins  have  been  forgiven." 

Our  Lord's  words  were  constantly  a  new  revelation  for  all  who 
heard  them,  and  if  we  may  judge  from  many  little  indications  in  the 
Gospels,  they  seem  often  to  have  been  followed,  in  the  early  days  of 
His  ministry,  by  a  shock  of  surprised  silence,  which  at  a  later  date, 
among  those  who  rejected  Him,  broke  out  into  •  fierce  reproaches 
and  indignant  murmurs.  At  this  stage  of  His  work,  the  spell  of 
awe  and  majesty  produced  by  His  love  and  purity,  and  by  that  inward 
Divinity  which  shone  in  His  countenance  and  sounded  in  His  voice, 


140  THE    LIFE    OP   CHRIST. 

had  not  yet  been  broken.  It  was  only  in  their  secret  thoughts  that 
the  guests — rather,  it  seems,  in  astonishment  than  in  wrath — ventured 
to  question  this  calm  and  simple  claim  to  a  more  than  earthly 
attribute.  It  was  only  in  their  hearts  that  they  silently  mused 
and  questioned,  "  Who  is  this,  who  forgiveth  sins  also  ?  "  Jesus  knew 
their  inward  hesitations ;  but  it  had  been  prophesied  of  Him  that  "  He 
should  not  strive  nor  cry,  neither  should  His  voice  be  heard  in  the 
streets; "  and  because  He  would  not  break  the  bruised  reed  of  their 
faith,  or  quench  the  smoking  flax  of  their  reverent  amazement,  He 
gently  sent  away  the  woman  who  had  been  a  sinner  with  the  kind 
words,  "  Thy  faith  hath  saved  thee :  go  into  peace."  And  to  peace 
beyond  all  doubt  she  went,  even  to  the  peace  of  God  which  passeth  all 
understanding,  to  the  peace  which  Jesus  gives,  which  is  not  as  the 
world  gives.  To  the  general  lesson  which  her  story  inculcates  we 
shall  return  hereafter,  for  it  is  one  which  formed  a  central  doctrine  of 
Christ's  revelation ;  I  mean  the  lesson  that  cold  and  selfish  hypocrisy 
is  in  the  sight  of  God  as  hateful  as  more  glaring  sin ;  the  lesson  that  a 
life  of  sinful  and  impenitent  respectability  may  be  no  less  deadly  and 
dangerous  than  a  life  of  open  shame.  But  meanwhile  the  touching 
words  of  an  English  poet  may  serve  as  the  best  comment  on  this 
beautiful  incident : — 

"  She  sat  and  wept  beside  his  feet ;  the  weight 
Of  sin  oppressed  her  heart ;  for  all  the  blame, 
And  the  poor  malice  of  the  worldly  shame, 
To  her  were  past,  extinct,  and  out  of  date ; 
Only  the  sin  remained — the  leprous  state. 
She  would  be  melted  by  the  heat  of  love, 
By  fires  far  fiercer  than  are  blown  to  prove 
And  purge  the  silver  ore  adulterate. 
She  sat  and  wept,  and  with  her  untressed  hair, 
Still  wiped  the  feet  she  was  so  blessed  to  touch  j 
And  he  wiped  off  the  soiling  of  despair 
From  her  sweet  soul,  because  she  loved  so  much." 

An  ancient  tradition — especially  prevalent  in  the  Western  Church, 
and  followed  by  the  translators  of  our  English  version — a  tradition 
which,  though  it  must  ever  remain  uncertain,  is  not  in  itself  improb- 
able, and  cannot  be  disproved — identifies  this  woman  with  Mary  of 
Magdala,  "  out  of  whom  Jesus  cast  seven  devils."  This  exorcism  is 
not  elsewhere  alluded  to,  and  it  would  be  perfectly  in  accordance  with 
the  genius  of  Hebrew  phraseology  if  the  expression  had  been  applied  to 
hcv,  in  consequence  of  a  passionate  nature  and  an  abandoned  life.  The 


TIIE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  1  U 

Taluiudists  have  much  to  say  respecting  her — her  wealth,  her  extreme 
beauty,  her  braided  locks,  her  shameless  profligacy,  her  husband 
Pappus,  and  her  paramour  Pandera ;  but  all  that  we  really  know  of 
the  Magdalene  from  Scripture  is  that  enthusiasm  of  devotion  and 
gratitude  which  attached  her,  heart  and  soul,  to  her  Saviour's  service. 
In  the  chapter  of  St.  Luke  which  follows  this  incident  she  is  mentioned 
first  among  the  women  who  accompanied  Jesus  in  His  wanderings,  and 
ministered  to  Him  of  their  substance ;  and  it  may  be  that  in  the  narrative 
of  the  incident  at  Simon's  house  her  name  was  suppressed,  out  of  that 
delicate  consideration  which,  in  other  passages,  makes  the  Evangelist 
suppress  the  condition  of  Matthew  and  the  name  of  Peter.  It  may 
be,  indeed,  that  the  woman  who  was  a  sinner  went  to  find  the  peace 
which  Christ  had  promised  to  her  troubled  conscience  in  a  life  of  deep 
seclusion  and  obscurity,  which  meditated  in  silence  on  the  merciful 
forgiveness  of  her  Lord ;  but  in  the  popular  consciousness  she  will  till 
the  end  of  time  be  identified  with  the  Magdalene  whose  very  name 
has  passed  into  all  civilised  languages  as  a  synonym  for  accepted 
penitence  and  pardoned  sin.  The  traveller  who,  riding  among  the 
delicate  perfumes  of  many  flowering  plants  on  the  shores  of  Gren- 
nesareth,  comes  to  the  ruinous  tower  and  solitary  palm- tree  that  mark 
the  Arab  village  of  El  Mejdel,  will  involuntarily  recall  this  old  tradition 
of  her  whose  sinful  beauty  and  deep  repentance  have  made  the  name 
of  Magdala  so  famous  ;  and  though  the  few  miserable  peasant  huts  are 
squalid  and  ruinous,  and  the  inhabitants  are  living  in  ignorance  and 
degradation,  he  will  still  look  with  interest  and  emotion  on  a  site 
which  brings  back  into  his  memory  one  of  the  most  signal  proofs  that 
no  one — not  even  the  most  fallen  and  the  most  despised — is  regarded 
as  an  outcast  by  Him  whose  very  work  it  was  to  seek  and  save  that 
which  was  lost.  Perhaps  in  the  balmy  air  of  Grennesareth,  in  the 
brightness  of  the  sky  above  his  head,  in  the  sound  of  the  singing 
birds  which  fills  the  air,  in  the  masses  of  purple  blossom  which  at 
some  seasons  of  the  year  festoons  these  huts  of  mud,  he  may  see  a 
type  of  the  love  and  tenderness  which  is  large  and  rich  enough  to 


encircle  with  the  grace  of  fresh  and  heavenly  beauty  the  ruins  of  a 
once  earthly  and  desecrated  life. 


142  THE   LIFE   OF   CHEIST. 

CHAPTER    XXII. 

JESUS  AS   HE   LIVED   IN   GALILEE. 

IT  is  to  this  period  of  our  Lord's  earlier  ministry  that  those  mission 
journeys  belong — those  circuits  through  the  towns  and  villages  of 
Galilee,  teaching,  and  preaching,  and  performing  works  of  mercy — 
which  are  so  frequently  alluded  to  in  the  first  three  Gospels,  and 
which  are  specially  mentioned  at  this  point  of  the  narrative  by  the 
Evangelist  St.  Luke.  "He  walked  in  Galilee."  It  was  the  brightest, 
hopefullest,  most  active  episode  in  His  life.  Let  us,  in  imagination, 
stand  aside  and  see  Him  pass,  and  so,  with  all  humility  and  reverence, 
set  before  us  as  vividly  as  we  can  what  manner  of  man  He  was. 

Let  us  then  suppose  ourselves  to  mingle  with  any  one  fragment  of 
those  many  multitudes  which  at  this  period  awaited  Him  at  every 
point  of  His  career,  and  let  us  gaze  on  Him  as  they  did  when  He  was 
a  man  on  earth. 

We  are  on  that  little  plain  that  runs  between  the  hills  of  Zebulon 
and  Naphtali,  somewhere  between  the  villages  of  Kefr  Kenna  and  the 
so-called  Kana  el-Jalil.  A  sea  of  corn,  fast  yellowing  to  the  harvest, 
is  around  us,  and  the  bright,  innumerable  flowers  that  broider  the 
wayside  are  richer  and  larger  than  those  of  home.  The  path  on  which 
we  stand  leads  in  one  direction  to  Accho  and  the  coast,  in  the  other 
over  the  summit  of  Hattin  to  the  Sea  of  Galilee.  The  land  is  lovely 
with  all  the  loveliness  of  a  spring  day  in  Palestine,  but  the  hearts  of 
the  eager,  excited  crowd,  in  the  midst  of  which  we  stand,  are  too 
much  occupied  by  one  absorbing  thought  to  notice  its  beauty;  for 
some  of  them  are  blind,  and  sick,  and  lame,  and  they  know  not 
whether  to-day  a  finger  of  mercy,  a  word  of  healing — nay,  even  the 
touch  of  the  garment  of  this  great  Unknown  Prophet  as  He  passes 
by — may  not  alter  and  gladden  the  whole  complexion  of  their  future 
lives.  And  farther  back,  at  a  little  distance  from  the  crowd,  standing 
among  the  wheat,  with  covered  lips,  and  warning  off  all  who 
approached  them  with  the  cry  Tame,  Tame — "Unclean!  unclean!  " — 
clad  in  mean  and  scanty  garments,  are  some  fearful  and  mutilated 
figures  whom,  with  a  shudder,  we  recognise  as  lepers. 

The  comments  of  the  crowd  show  that  many  different  motives  have 
brought  them  together.  Some  are  there  from  interest,  some  from 
curiosity,  some  from  the  vulgar  contagion  of  enthusiasm  which  they 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHE1ST.  143 

cannot  themselves  explain.  Marvellous  tales  of  Him — of  His  mercy, 
of  His  power,  of  His  gracious  words,  of  His  mighty  deeds — are  passing 
from  Hp  to  lip,  mingled,  doubtless,  with  suspicions  and  calumnies. 
One  or  two  Scribes  and  Pharisees  who  are  present,  holding  themselves 
a  little  apart  from  the  crowd,  whisper  to  each  other  their  perplexities, 
their  indignation,  their  alarm. 

Suddenly  over  the  rising  ground,  at  no  great  distance,  is  seen  the 
cloud  of  dust  which  marks  an  approaching  company ;  and  a  young 
boy  of  Magdala  or  Bethsaida,  heedless  of  the  scornful  reproaches  of  the 
Scribes,  points  in  that  direction,  and  runs  excitedly  forward  with  the 
shont  of  Malka  MesMchah  !  Malka  Meshichah — "  the  King  Messiah  ! 
the  King  Messiah! " — which  even  on  youthful  lips  must  have  quickened 
the  heart-beats  of  a  simple  Galilcean  throng. 

And  now  the  throng  approaches.  It  is  a  motley  multitude  of 
young  and  old,  composed  mainly  of  peasants,  but  with  others  of  higher 
rank  interspersed  in  their  loose  array — here  a  frowning  Pharisee,  there 
a  gaily-clad  Herodian  whispering  to  some  Greek  merchant  or  Roman 
soldier  his  scoffing  comments  on  the  enthusiasm  of  the  crowd.  But 
these  are  the  few,  and  almost  every  eye  of  that  large  throng  is  con- 
stantly directed  towards  One  who  stands  in  the  centre  of  the  separate 
group  which  the  crowd  surrounds. 

In  the  front  of  this  group  walk  some  of  the  newly-chosen  Apostles : 
behind  are  others,  among  whom  there  is  one  whose  restless  glance  and 
saturnine  countenance  accord  but  little  with  that  look  of  openness 
and  innocence  which  stamps  his  comrades  as  honest  men.  Some  of 
those  who  are  looking  on  whisper  that  he  is  a  certain  Judas  of  Kerioth, 
almost  the  only  follower  of  Jesus  who  is  not  a  Galilaean.  A  little 
further  in  the  rear,  behind  the  remainder  of  the  Apostles,  are  four  or 
five  women,  some  on  foot,  some  on  mules,  among  whom,  though  they 
are  partly  veiled,  there  are  some  who  recognise  the  once  wealthy 
and  dissolute  but  now  repentant  Mary  of  Magdala ;  and  Salome,  the 
wife  of  the  fisherman  Zabclia ;  and  one  of  still  higher  wealth  and 
position,  Joanna,  the  wife  of  Chuza,  steward  of  Herod  Antipas. 

But  He  whom  all  eyes  seek  is  in  the  very  centre  of  the  throng ; 
and  though  at  His  right  is  Peter  of  Bethsaida,  and  at  His  left  the 
more  youthful  figure  of  John,  yet  every  glance  is  absorbed  by  Him 
alone. 

He  is  not  clothed  in  soft  raiment  of  byssus  or  purple,  like  Herod's 
courtiers,  or  the  luxurious  friends  of  the  Procurator  Pilate :  He  does 
not  wear  the  white  ephod  of  the  Levite,  or  the  sweeping  robes  of  the 


144  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

Scribe.  There  are  not,  on  His  arm  and  forehead,  the  tephillin  or 
phylacteries,  which  the  Pharisees  make  so  broad ;  and  though  there  is 
at  each  corner  of  His  dress  the  fringe  and  blue  riband  which  the  Law 
enjoins,  it  is  not  worn  of  the  ostentatious  size  affected  by  those  who 
wished  to  parade  the  scrupulousness  of  their  obedience.  He  is  in  the 
ordinary  dress  of  his  time  and  country.  He  is  not  bareheaded — as 
painters  usually  represent  Him — for  to  move  about  bareheaded  in  the 
Syrian  sunlight  is  impossible,  but  a  white  Iceffiyeh,  such  as  is  worn  to 
this  day,  covers  his  hair,  fastened  by  an  agTial  or  fillet  round  the  top 
of  the  head,  and  falling  back  over  the  neck  and  shoulders.  A  large 
blue  outer  robe  or  talttth,  pure  and  clean,  but  of  the  simplest  materials, 
covers  His  entire  person,  and  only  shows  occasional  glimpses  of  the 
Jcetoneth,  a  seamless  woollen  tunic  of  the  ordinary  striped  texture,  so 
common  in  the  East,  which  is  confined  by  a  girdle  round  the  waist, 
and  which  clothes  Him  from  the  neck  almost  down  to  the  sandalled 
feet.  But  the  simple  garments  do  not  conceal  the  King ;  and  though 
in  His  bearing  there  is  nothing  of  the  self-conscious  haughtiness  of 
the  Rabbi,  yet,  in  its  natural  nobleness  and  unsought  grace,  it  is  such 
as  instantly  suffices  to  check  every  rude  tongue  and  overawe  every 
wicked  thought. 

And  His  aspect  ?  He  is  a  man  of  middle  size,  and  of  about  thirty 
years  of  age,  on  whose  face  the  purity  and  charm  of  youth  are  mingled 
with  the  thoughtfulness  and  dignity  of  manhood.  His  hair,  which 
legend  has  compared  to  the  colour  of  wine,  is  parted  in  the  middle  of 
the  forehead,  and  flows  down  over  the  neck.  His  features  are  paler 
and  of  a  more  Hellenic  type  than  the  weather-bronzed  and  olive-tinted 
faces  of  the  hardy  fishermen  who  are  His  Apostles  ;  but  though  those 
features  have  evidently  been  marred  by  sorrow — though  it  is  manifest 
that  those  eyes,  whose  pure  and  indescribable  glance  seems  to  read  the 
very  secrets  of  the  heart,  have  often  glowed  through  tears — yet  no 
man,  whose  soul  has  not  been  eaten  away  by  sin  and  selfishness,  can 
look  unmoved  and  unawed  on  the  divine  expression  of  that  calm  and 
patient  face.  Yes,  this  is  He  of  whom  Moses  and  the  Prophets  did 
speak — Jesus  of  Nazareth,  the  Son  of  Mary,  and  the  Son  of  David ; 
and  the  Son  of  Man,  and  the  Son  of  God.  Our  eyes  have  seen  the 
King  in  His  beauty.  We  have  beheld  His  glory,  the  glory  as  of  the 
only-begotten  of  the  Father,  full  of  grace  and  truth.  And  having  seen 
Him  we  can  well  understand  how,  while  He  spake,  a  certain  woman  of 
the  company  lifted  up  her  voice  and  said,  "  Blessed  is  the  womb  that 
bare  Thee,  and  the  paps  that  Thou  hast  sucked !  "  "  Yea,  rather 


THE   LIFE    OK   CHIilST.  145 

blessed,"  He  answered,  in  words  full  of  deep  sweet  mystery,  "  are  they 
that  hear  the  word  of  God  and  keep  it." 

One  or  two  facts  and  features  of  His  life  on  earth  may  here  be  fitly 
introduced. 

1.  First,  then,  it  was  a  life  of  poverty.     Some  of  the  old  Messianic 
prophecies,  which  the  Jews  in  general  so  little  understood,  had  already 
indicated  His  voluntary  submission  to  a  humble  lot.     "  Though  He 
were  rich,  yet  for  our  sakes  He  became  poor."     He  was  born  in  the 
cavern-stable,   cradled  in   the  manger.     His  mother  offered  for  her 
purification  the  doves  which  were  the  offering  of  the  poor.     The  flight 
into  Egypt  was  doubtless  accompanied  with  many  a  hardship,  and 
when  He  returned  it  was  to  live  as  a  carpenter,  and  the  son  of  a 
carpenter,  in  the  despised  provincial  village.     It  was  as  a  poor  wander- 
ing teacher,  possessing  nothing,  that  He  travelled  through  the  land. 
With  the  words,   "Blessed  are   the  poor  in  spirit,"   He  began  His 
Sermon  on  the  Mount ;  and  He  made  it  the  chief  sign  of  the  opening 
dispensation  that  to  the  poor  the  Gospel  was  being  preached.     It  was 
a  fit  comment  on  this  His  poverty,  that  after  but  three  short  years  of 
His  public  ministry  He  was  sold  by  one  of  His  own  Apostles  for  the 
thirty  shekels  which  were  the  price  of  the  meanest  slave. 

2.  And  the  simplicity  of   His   life   corresponded  to   its  external 
poverty.     Never  in  His  life  did  He  possess  a  roof  which  He  could  call 
His  own.     The  humble  abode  at  Nazareth  was  but  shared  with  nume- 
rous brothers  and  sisters.     Even  the  house  in  Capernaum  which  He  so 
often  visited  was  not  His  own  possession ;  it  was  lent  Him  by  one 
of  His  disciples.     There  never  belonged  to  Him  one  foot's-breadth  of 
the  earthjwhich  He  came  to  saye.^  We  never  hear  that  any  of  the 
beggars,   who   in  every   Eastern   country  are   so  numerous   and  so 
importunate,  asked  Him  for  alms.     Had  they  done  so  He  might  have 
answered  with  Peter,  "  Silver  and  gold  have  I  none,  but  such  as  I 
have  that  give  I  thee/*'    His  food  was  of  the  plainest.     He  was  ready, 
indeed,  when   invited,  to  join   in  the  innocent   social  happiness   of 
Simon's,  or  Levi's,  or  Martha's,  or  the  bridegroom  of  Cana's  feast ; 
but  His  ordinary  food  was  as  simple  as  that  of  the  humblest  peasant 
— bread  of  the  coarsest  quality,  fish  caught  in  the  lake  and  broiled  in 
embers  on  the  shore,  and  sometimes  a  piece  of  honeycomb,  probably 
of  the  wild  honey  which  was  then  found  abundantly  in  Palestine. 
Small  indeed  was  the  gossamer  thread  of  semblance  on  which  His 
enemies    could    support    the  weight   of    their  outrageous    calumny, 
"  Behold  a  glutton  and  a  wine-bibber."     And  yet  Jesus,  though  poor, 


146  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

was  not  a  pauper.  He  did  not  for  one  moment  countenance  (as  Sakya 
Mouni  did)  the  life  of  beggary,  or  say  one  word  which  could  be  per- 
verted into  a  recommendation  of  that  degrading  squalor  which  some 
religious  teachers  have  represented  as  the  perfection  of  piety.  He 
never  received  an  alms  from  the  tamchui  or  Jcuppa,  but  He  and  the 
little  company  of  His  followers  lived  on  their  lawful  possessions  or  the 
produce  of  their  own  industry,  and  even  had  a  bag  or  cash-box  of 
their  own,  both  for  their  own  use  and  for  their  charities  to  others. 
From  this  they  provided  the  simple  necessaries  of  the  Paschal  feast, 
and  distributed  what  they  could  to  the  poor ;  only  Christ  does  not 
Himself  seem  to  have  given  money  to  the  poor,  because  He  gave  them 
richer  and  nobler  gifts  than  could  be  even  compared  with  gold  or 
silver.  Yet  even  the  little  money  which  they  wanted  was  not  always 
forthcoming,  and  when  the  collectors  of  the  trivial  sum  demanded 
from  the  very  poorest  for  the  service  of  the  Temple  came  to  Peter 
for  the  didrachma  which  was  alone  required,  neither  he  nor  his 
Master  had  the  sum  at  hand.  The  Son  of  Man  had  no  earthly 
possession  besides  the  clothes  He  wore. 

3.  And  it  was,  as  we  have  seen,  a  life  of  toil — of  toil  from  boyhood 
upwards,  in  the  shop  of  the  carpenter,  to  aid  in  maintaining  Himself 
and  His  family  by  honest  and  noble  labour  ;  of  toil  afterwards  to  save 
the  world.     We  have  seen  that  "He  went  about  doing  good,"   and 
that  this,  which  is  the  epitome  of  His  public  life,  constitutes  also  its 
sublimest  originality.    The  insight  which  we  have  gained  already,  and 
shall  gain  still  further,  into  the  manner  in  which  His  days  were  spent, 
shows  us  how  overwhelming  an  amount  of  ever-active  benevolence 
was  crowded  into  the  brief  compass  of  the  hours  of  light.     At  any 
moment  He  was  at  the  service  of  any  call,  whether  it  came  from  an 
inquirer  who  longed  to  be  taught,  or  from  a  sufferer  who  had  faith  to 
be  healed.     Teaching,  preaching,  travelling,   doing  works  of  mercy, 
bearing  patiently  with  the  fretful  impatience  of  the  stiffnecked  and 
the  ignorant,  enduring  without  a  murmur  the  incessant  and  selfish 
pressure  of  the  multitude — work  like  this  so  absorbed  His  time  and 
energy  that  we  are  told,  more  than  once,  that  so  many  were  coming 
and  going  as  to  leave  no  leisure  even  to  eat.     For  Himself  Ho  seemed 
to  claim  no  rest  except  the  quiet  hours  of  night  and  silence,  when  He 
retired  so  often  to  pray  to  His  heavenly  Father,  amid  the  mountain 
solitudes  which  He  loved  so  well. 

4.  And  it  was  a  life  of  health.    Among  its  many  sorrows  and  trials, 
sickness  alone  was  absent.      We  hear  of  His  healing  multitudes  of  the 


THK   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  147 

sick — we  never  hear  that  He  was  sick  Himself.  It  is  trne  that  "  the 
golden  Passional  of  the  Book  of  Isaiah  "  says  of  Him  :  "  Surely  He 
hath  borne  onr  griefs,  and  carried  our  sorrows  ;  yet  we  did  esteem 
Him  stricken,  smitten  of  God,  and  afflicted.  But  He  was  wounded 
for  our  transgressions  ;  He  was  bruised  for  our  iniquities ;  the  chastise- 
ment of  our  peace  was  upon  Him,  and  with  His  stripes  we  are  healed ; " 
but  the  best  explanation  of  that  passage  has  been  already  supplied 
from  St.  Matthew,  that  He  suffered  with  those  whom  He  saw  suffer. 
He  was  touched  with  a  feeling  of  our  infirmities  ;  His  divine  sympathy 
made  those  sufferings  His  own.  Certain  it  is  that  the  story  of  His 
life  and  death  show  exceptional  powers  of  physical  endurance.  No 
one  who  was  not  endowed  with  perfect  health  could  have  stood  out 
against  the  incessant  and  wearing  demands  of  such  daily  life  as  the 
Gospels  describe.  Above  all,  He  seems  to  have  possessed  that  blessing 
of  ready  sleep  which  is  the  best  natural  antidote  to  fatigue,  and  the 
best  influence  to  calm  the  over- wearied  mind,  and  "  knit  np  the 
ravelled  sleeve  of  care."  Even  on  the  wave-lashed  deck  of  the  little 
fishing-boat  as  it  was  tossed  on  the  stormy  sea,  He  could  sleep,  with 
no  better  bed  or  pillow  than  the  hard  leather-covered  boss  that  served 
as  the  steersman's  cushion.  And  often  in  those  nights  spent  under  the 
starry  sky,  in  the  wilderness,  and  on  the  mountain-top,  He  can  have 
had  no  softer  resting-place  than  the  grassy  turf,  no  other  covering 
than  the  tallWi,  or  perhaps  some  striped  abba,  such  as  often  forms  the 
sole  bed  of  the  Arab  at  the  present  day.  And  we  shall  see  in  the  last 
sad  scene  how  the  same  strength  of  constitution  and  endurance,  even 
after  all  that  He  had  undergone,  enabled  Him  to  hold  out — after  a 
sleepless  night  and  a  most  exhausting  day — under  fifteen  hours  of 
trial  and  torture  and  the  long-protracted  agony  of  a  bitter  death. 

5.  And,  once  more,  it  must  have  been  a  life  of  sorrow ;  for  He  is 
rightly  called  the  "  Man  of  Sorrows."  And  yet  we  think  that  there 
is  a  possibility  of  error  here.  The  terms  "  sorrow  "  and  "  joy  "  are 
very  relative,  and  we  may  be  sure  that  if  there  was  crushing  sorrow — 
the  sorrow  of  sympathy  with  those  who  suffered,  the  sorrow  of  rejec- 
tion by  those  whom  He  loved,  the  sorrow  of  being  hated  by  those 
whom  He  came  to  save,  the  sorrows  of  One  on  whom  were  laid  the 
iniquities  of  the  world,  the  sorrows  of  the  last  long  agony  upon  the 
cross,  when  it  seemed  as  if  even  His  Father  had  forsaken  Him — yet 
assuredly  also  there  was  an  abounding  joy.  For  the  worst  of  all 
sorrows,  the  most  maddening  of  all  miseries — which  is  the  conscious- 
ness of  alienation  from  God,  the  sense  of  shame  and  guilt  and  inward 

L  2 


148  THE   LIFE    OF   CHKIST. 

degradation,  the  frenzy  of  self-loathing  by  which,  as  by  a  scourge 
of  fire,  the  abandoned  sonl  is  driven  to  an  incurable  despair — that 
•was  absent,  not  only  in  its  extreme  forms,  but  even  in  the  faintest  of 
its  most  transient  assoilments ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  the  joy  of  an 
unsullied  conscience,  the  joy  of  a  stainless  life,  the  joy  of  a  soul 
absolutely  and  infinitely  removed  from  every  shadow  of  baseness 
and  every  fleck  of  guilt,  the  joy  of  an  existence  wholly  devoted  to 
the  service  of  God  and  the  love  of  man — this  was  ever  present  to  Him 
in  its  fullest  influences.  It  is  hardly  what  the  world  calls  joy  ;  it  was 
not  the  merriment  of  the  frivolous,  like  the  transient  flickering  of 
April  sunshine  upon  the  shallow  stream ;  it  was  not  the  laughter  of 
fools,  which  is  as  the  crackling  of  thorns  under  a  pot — of  this  kind  of 
joy,  life  has  but  little  for  a  man  who  feels  all  that  life  truly  means. 
But,  as  is  said  by  the  great  Latin  Father,  "  Crede  mild  res  sever  a  est 
verum  gaudium,"  and  of  that  deep  well-spring  of  life  which  lies  in 
the  heart  of  things  noble,  and  pure,  and  permanent,  and  true,  even 
the  Man  of  Sorrows  could  drink  large  draughts.  And  though  we  are 
never  told  that  He  laughed,  while  we  are  told  that  once  He  wept,  and 
that  once  He  sighed,  and  that  more  than  once  He  was  troubled  ;  yet 
He  who  threw  no  shadow  of  discountenance  on  social  meetings  and 
innocent  festivity,  could  not  have  been  without  that  inward  happiness 
which  sometimes  shone  even  upon  His  countenance,  and  which  we 
often  trace  in  the  tender  and  almost  playful  irony  of  His  words.  "In 
that  hour,"  we  are  told  of  one  occasion  in  His  life,  "  Jesus  rejoiced  " — 
or,  as  it  should  rather  be,  exulted — "  in  spirit."  Can  we  believe  that 
this  rejoicing  took  place  once  alone  ? 


CHAPTER  XXIH. 

A  QBE  AT  DAT  IN  THB  LIFE  OF  JESUS. 

THE  sequence  of  events  in  the  narrative  on  which  we  are  now  about  to 
enter  is  nearly  the  same  in  the  first  three  Gospels.  Without  neglect- 
ing any  clear  indications  given  by  the  other  Evangelists,  we  shall,  in 
this  part  of  the  life  of  Jesus,  mainly  follow  the  chronological  guidance 
of  St.  Luke.  The  order  of  St.  Matthew  and  St.  Mark  appears  to  be 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHKIST.  149 

much  guided  by  subjective  considerations.  Events  in  their  Gospels 
are  sometimes  grouped  together  by  their  moral  or  religious  bearings. 
St.  Luke,  as  is  evident,  pays  more  attention  to  the  natural  sequence, 
although  he  also  occasionally  allows  a  unity  of  subject  to  supersede  in 
his  arrangement  the  order  of  time. 

Immediately  after  the  missionary  journey  which  we  have  described, 
St.  Luke  adds  that  when  Jesus  saw  Himself  surrounded  by  a  great 
multitude  out  of  every  city,  He  spake  by  a  parable.  We  learn  from 
the  two  other  Evangelists  the  interesting  circumstance  that  this  was 
the  first  occasion  on  which  He  taught  in  parables,  and  that  they  were 
spoken  to  the  multitude  who  lined  the  shore  while  our  Lord  sat  in  His 
favourite  pulpit,  the  boat  which  was  kept  for  Him  on  the  Lake. 

We  might  infer  from  St.  Mark  that  this  teaching  was  delivered  on 
the  afternoon  of  the  day  on  which  he  healed  the  paralytic,  but  the 
inference  is  too  precarious  to  be  relied  on.  All  that  we  can  see  is 
that  this  new  form  of  teaching  was  felt  to  be  necessary  in  consequence 
of  the  state  of  mind  which  had  been  produced  in  some,  at  least,  of  the 
hearers  among  the  multitude.  The  one  emphatic  word  "hearken!" 
with  which  He  prefaced  his  address  prepared  them  for  something 
unusual  and  memorable  in  what  He  was  going  to  say. 

The  great  mass  of  hearers  must  now  have  been  aware  of  the 
general  features  in  the  new  Gospel  which  Jesus  preached.  Some  self- 
examination,  some  earnest  careful  thought  of  their  own  was  now 
requisite,  if  they  were  indeed  sincere  in  their  desire  to  profit  by  His 
words.  "  Take  heed  how  ye  hear "  was  the  great  lesson  which  He 
would  now  impress.  He  would  warn  them  against  the  otiose  attention 
of  curiosity  or  mere  intellectual  interest,  and  would  fix  upon  their 
minds  a  sense  of  their  moral  responsibility  for  the  effects  produced  by 
what  they  heard.  He  would  teach  them  in  such  a  way  that  the  extent 
of  each  hearer's  profit  should  depend  largely  upon  his  own  faithfulness. 

And,  therefore,  to  show  them  that  the  only  true  fruit  of  good 
teaching  is  holiness  of  life,  and  that  there  were  many  dangers  which 
might  prevent  its  growth,  He  told  them  His  first  parable,  the  Parable 
of  the  Sower.  The  imagery  of  it  was  derived,  as  usual,  from  the 
objects  immediately  before  his  eyes — the  sown  fields  of  Gennesareth ; 
the  springing  corn  in  them ;  the  hard-trodden  paths  which  ran  through 
them,  on  which  no  corn  could  grow ;  the  innumerable  birds  which 
fluttered  over  them  ready  to  feed  upon  the  grain;  the  weak  and 
withering  struggle  for  life  on  the  stony  places  ;  the  tangling  growth 
of  luxuriant  thistles  in  neglected  corners ;  the  deep  loam  of  the 


150  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

general  soil,  on  which  already  the  golden  ears  stood  thick  and 
strong,  giving  promise  of  a  sixty  and  hundredfold  return  as  they 
rippled  under  the  balmy  wind.  To  us,  who  from,  infancy  have 
read  the  parable  side  by  side  with  Christ's  own  interpretation  of 
it,  the  meaning  is  singularly  clear  and  plain,  and  we  see  in  it  the 
liveliest  images  of  the  danger  incurred  by  the  cold  and  indifferent,  by 
the  impulsive  and  shallow,  by  the  worldly  and  ambitious,  by  the  pre- 
occupied and  the  luxurious,  as  they  listen  to  the  "Word  of  God.  But 
it  was  not  so  easy  to  those  who  heard  it.  Even  the  disciples  failed  to 
catch  its  full  significance,  although  they  reserved  their  request  for  an 
explanation  till  they  and  their  Master  should  be  alone.  It  is  clear 
that  parables  like  this,  so  luminous  to  us,  but  so  difficult  to  these 
simple  listeners,  suggested  thoughts  which  to  them  were  wholly  un- 
familiar. 

It  seems  clear  that  our  Lord  did  not  on  this  occasion  deliver  all  of 
those  seven  parables — the  parable  of  the  tares  of  the»field,  of  the  grain 
of  mustard-seed,  of  the  leaven,  of  the  hid  treasure,  of  the  pearl,  and  <jf 
the  net — which,  from  a  certain  resemblance  in  their  subjects  and  con- 
secutiveness  in  their  teaching,  are  here  grouped  together  by  St. 
Matthew.  Seven  parables  delivered  at  once,  and  delivered  without 
interpretation,  to  a  promiscuous  multitude  which  He  was  for  the  first 
time  addressing  in  this  form  of  teaching,  would  have  only  tended  to 
bewilder  and  to  distract.  Indeed,  the  expression  of  St.  Mark — "as 
they  were  able  to  hear  it " — seems  distinctly  to  imply  a  gradual  and 
non- continuous  course  of  teaching,  which  would  have  lost  its  value  if 
it  had  given  to  the  listeners  more  than  they  were  able  to  remember  and 
to  understand.  We  may  rather  conclude,  from  a  comparison  of  St. 
Mark  and  St.  Luke,  that  the  teaching  of  this  particular  afternoon  con- 
tained no  other  parables,  except  perhaps  the  simple  and  closely 
analogous  ones  of  the  grain  of  mustard- seed,  and  of  the  blade,  the 
ear,  and  the  full  corn  in  the  ear,  which  might  serve  to  encourage  into 
patience  those  who  were  expecting  too  rapid  a  revelation  of  the 
kingdom  of  God  in  their  own  lives  and  in  the  world;  and  perhaps, 
with  these,  the  similitude  of  the  candle  to  warn  them  not  to  stifle  the 
light  they  had  received,  but  to  remember  that  Great  Light  which 
should  one  day  reveal  all  things,  and  so  to  let  their  light  shine  as  to 
illuminate  both  their  own  paths  in  life^and  to  shed  radiance  on  the 
souls  of  all  around. 

A  method  of  instruction  so  rare,  so  stimulating,  so  full  of  interest 
— a  method  which,  in  its  unapproachable  beauty  and  finish,  stands 


THB    LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  151 

unrivalled  in  the  annals  of  human  speech — would  doubtless  tend  to 
increase  beyond  measure  the  crowds  that  thronged  to  listen.  And 
through  the  sultry  afternoon  He  continued  to  teach  them,  barely 
succeeding  in  dismissing  them  when  the  evening  was  come.  A  sense 
of  complete  weariness  and  deep  unspeakable  longing  for  repose,  and 
solitude,  and  sleep,  seems  then  to  have  come  over  our  Lord's  spirit. 
Possibly  the  desire  for  rest  and  quiet  may  have  been  accelerated  by 
one  more  ill-judged  endeavour  of  His  mother  and  His  brethren  to 
assert  a  claim  upon  His  actions.  They  had  not  indeed  been  able  "  to 
come  at  Him  for  the  press,"  but  their  attempt  to  do  so  may  have  been 
one  more  reason  for  a  desire  to  get  away,  and  be  free  for  a  time  from 
this  incessant  publicity,  from  these  irreverent  interferences.  At  any 
rate,  one  little  touch,  preserved  for  us  as  usual  by  the  graphic  pen  of 
the  Evangelist  St.  Mark,  shows  that  there  was  a  certain  eagerness  and 
urgency  in  His  departure,  as  though  in  His  weariness,  and  in  that 
oppression  of  mind  which  results  from  the  wearing  contact  with 
numbers,  He  coula  not  return  to  Capernaum,  but  suddenly  determined 
on  a  change  of  plan.  After  dismissing  the  crowd,  the  disciples  took 
Him,  "as  He  was,"  in  the  boat,  no  time  being  left,  in  the  urgency  of 
His  spirit,  for  preparation  of  any  kind.  He  yearned  for  the  quiet  and 
deserted  loneliness  of  the  eastern  shore.  The  western  shore  also  is 
lonely  now,  and  the  traveller  will  meet  no  human  being  there  but  a 
few  careworn  Fellahin,  or  a  Jew  from  Tiberias,  or  some  Arab  fisher- 
men, or  an  armed  and  mounted  Sheykh  of  some  tribe  of  Bedawin. 
But  the  eastern  shore  is  loneliness  itself ;  not  a  tree,  not  a  village,  not 
a  human  being,  not  a  single  habitation  is  visible  ;  nothing  but  the  low 
range  of  hills,  scarred  with  rocky  fissures,  and  sweeping  down  to  a 
narrow  and  barren  strip  which  forms  the  margin  of  the  Lake.  In  our 
Lord's  time  the  contrast  of  this  thinly-inhabited  region  with  the  busy 
and  populous  towns  that  lay  close  together  on  the  Plain  of  Gennesareth 
must  have  been  very  striking ;  and  though  the  scattered  population  of 
Perm  was  partly  Gentile,  we  shall  find  Him  not  unfrequently  seeking 
*to  recover  the  tone  and  calm  of  His  burdened  soul  by  putting  those  six 
miles  of  water  between  Himself  and  the  crowds  He  taught. 

But  before  the  boat  could  be  pushed  off,  another  remarkable  inter- 
ruption occurred.  Three  of  His  listeners  in  succession — struck 
perhaps  by  the  depth  and  power  of  this  His  new  method  of  teaching, 
dazzled  too  by  this  zenith  of  Hia  popularity — desired  or  fancied  that 
they  desired  to  attach  themselves  to  Him  as  permanent  disciples.  The 
first  was  a  Scribe,  who,  thinking  no  doubt  that  his  official  rank  would 


152  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

make  him  a  most  acceptable  disciple,  exclaimed  with,  confident 
asseveration,  "Lord,  I  will  follow  Thee  whithersoever  Thou  goest." 
But  in  spite  of  the  man's  high  position,  in  spite  of  His  glowing 
promises,  He  who  cared  less  than  nothing  for  lip-service,  and  who 
preferred  "  the  modesty  of  fearful  duty "  to  the  "  rattling  tongue  of 
audacious  eloquence,"  coldly  checked  His  would-be  follower.  He  who 
had  called  the  hated  publican  gave  no  encouragement  to  the  reputable 
scribe.  He  did  not  reject  the  proffered  service,  but  neither  did  He 
accept  it.  Perhaps  "in  the  man's  flaring  enthusiasm,  he  saw  the 
smoke  of  egotistical  self-deceit."  He  pointed  out  that  His  service  was 
not  one  of  wealth,  or  honour,  or  delight ;  not  one  in  which  any  could 
hope  for  earthly  gain.  "  The  foxes,"  He  said,  "  have  holes,  and  the 
birds  of  the  air  have  resting-places,  but  the  Son  of  Man  hath  not  where 
to  lay  His  head." 

The  second  was  already  a  partial  disciple,  but  wished  to  become  an 
entire  follower,  with  the  reservation  that  he  might  first  be  permitted 
to  bury  his  father.  "Follow  me!"  was  the  thrilling  answer,  "and 
let  the  dead  bury  their  dead ; "  that  is,  leave  the  world  and  the 
things  of  the  world  to  mind  themselves.  He  who  would  follow 
Christ  must  in  comparison  hate  even  father  and  mother.  He  must 
leave  the  spiritually  dead  to  attend  to  their  physically  dead. 

The  answer  to  the  third  aspirant  was  not  dissimilar.  He  too 
pleaded  for  delay — wished  not  to  join  Christ  immediately  in  His 
voyage,  but  first  of  all  to  bid  farewell  to  his  friends  at  home.  "  No 
man,"  was  the  reply — which  has  become  proverbial  for  all  time — 
"No  man  having  put  his  hand  to  the  plough,  and  looking  back,  is  fit 
for  the  kingdom  of  heaven."  To  use  the  fine  image  of  St.  Augustine, 
"  the  East  was  calling  him,  he  must  turn  his  thoughts  from  the  fading 
West."  It  was  in  this  spirit  that  the  loving  souls  of  St.  Thomas  of 
Aquino,  St.  Francis  of  Assisi,  St.  Francis  Xavier,  and  so  many  more 
of  the  great  saints  in  the  Church's  history  consoled  and  fortified  them- 
selves, when  forced  to  resign  every  family  affection,  and  for  Christ's 
sake  to  abandon  every  earthly  tie. 

So,  then,  at  last,  these  fresh  delays  were  over,  and  the  little  vessel 
could  spread  her  sails  for  the  voyage.  Yet  even  now  Jesus  was,  as  it 
were,  pursued  by  followers,  for,  as  St.  Mark  again  tells  us,  "other 
little  ships  were  with  Him."  But  they,  in  all  probability — since  we 
are  not  told  of  their  reaching  the  other  shore — were  soon  scattered  or 
frightened  back  by  the  signs  of  a  gathering  storm.  At  any  rate,  in 
His  own  boat,  and  among  His  own  trusted  disciples,  Jesus  could  rest 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHUIST.  153 

undisturbed,  and  long  before  they  were  far  from  shore,  had  lain  His 
weary  head  on  the  leather  cushion  of  the  steersman,  and  was  sleeping 
the  deep  sleep  of  the  worn  and  weary — the  calm  sleep  of  those  who 
are  at  peace  with  God. 

Even  that  sleep,  so  sorely  needed,  was  destined  to  speedy  and 
violent  disturbance.  One  of  the  fierce  storms  peculiar  to  that  deep 
hollow  in  the  earth's  surface,  swept  down  with  sudden  fury  on  the 
little  inland  sea.  With  scarcely  a  moment's  notice,  the  air  was  filled 
with  whirlwind  and  the  sea  buffeted  into  tempest.  The  danger  was 
extreme.  The  boat  was  again  and  again  buried  amid  the  foam  of  the 
breakers  which  burst  over  it ;  yet  though  they  must  have  covered  Him 
with  their  dashing  spray  as  He  lay  on  the  open  deck  at  the  stern,  He 
was  calmly  sleeping  on — undisturbed,  so  deep  was  his  fatigue,  by  the 
tempestuous  darkness — and  as  yet  no  one  ventured  to  awake  Him. 
But  now  the  billows  were  actually  breaking  into  the  boat  itself,  which 
was  beginning  to  be  filled  and  to  sink.  Then,  with  sudden  and  vehe- 
ment cries  of  excitement  and  terror,  the  disciples  woke  Him.  "  Lord ! 
Master  !  Master !  save  !  we  perish  !  "  Such  were  the  wild  sounds 
which,  mingled  with  the  howling  of  the  winds  and  the  dash  of  the 
mastering  waves,  broke  confusedly  upon  his  half -awakened  ear.  It  is 
such  crises  as  these — crises  of  sndden  unexpected  terror,  met  without 
a  moment  of  preparation,  which  test  a  man,  what  spirit  he  is  of — 
which  show  not  only  his  nerve,  but  the  grandeur  and  purity  of  his 
whole  nature.  The  hurricane  which  shook  the  tried  courage  and 
baffled  the  utmost  skill  of  the  hardy  fishermen,  did  not  ruffle  for  one 
instant  the  deep  inward  serenity  of  the  Son  of  Man.  Without  one 
sign  of  confusion,  without  one  tremor  of  alarm,  Jesus  simply  raised 
Himself  on  His  elbow  from  the  dripping  stern  of  the  labouring  and 
half-sinking  vessel,  and,  without  further  movement,  stilled  the  tempest 
of  their  souls  by  the  quiet  words,  "  Why  so  cowardly,  O  ye  of  little 
faith  ?  "  And  then  rising  up,  standing  in  all  the  calm  of  a  natural 
majesty  on  the  lofty  stern,  while  the  hurricane  tossed,  for  a  moment 
only,  His  fluttering  garments  and  streaming  hair,  He  gazed  forth  into 
the  darkness,  and  His  voice  was  heard  amid  the  roaring  of  the  troubled 
elements,  saying,  "  Peace,  be  still !  "  And  instantly  the  wind  dropped, 
and  there  was  a  great  calm.  And  as  they  watched  the  starlight  reflected 
on  the  now  unrippled  water,  not  the  disciples  only  but  even  the  sailors 
whispered  to  one  another,  "  What  manner  of  man  is  this  ?  " 

This  is  a  stupendous  miracle,  one  of  those  which  test  whether  we 
indeed  believe  in  the  credibility  of  the  miraculous  or  not;  one  of 


154  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

those  miracles  of  power  which  cannot,  like  many  of  the  miracles  of 
healing,  be  explained  away  by  existing  laws.  It  is  not  my  object  in 
this  book  to  convince  the  unbeliever,  or  hold  controversy  with  the 
doubter.  Something  of  what  I  had  to  say  on  this  subject  I  have  done 
my  little  best  to  say  in  my  Lectures  on  The  Witness  of  History  to  Christ; 
and  yet,  perhaps,  a  few  words  may  here  be  pardoned.  Some,  and  they 
neither  irreverent  nor  unfaithful  men,  have  asked  whether  the  reality 
may  not  have  been  somewhat  different  ?  whether  we  may  not  under- 
stand this  narrative  in  a  sense  like  that  in  which  we  should  understand 
it  if  we  found  it  in  the  reasonably-attested  legend  of  some  mediaeval 
saint — a  St.  Nicholas  or  a  St.  Brandan  ?  whether  we  may  not  suppose 
that  the  fact  which  underlies  the  narrative  was  in  reality  not  a  miracu- 
lous exercise  of  power  over  those  elements  which  are  most  beyond 
the  reach  of  man,  but  that  Christ's  calm  communicated  itself  by 
immediate  and  subble  influence  to  His  terrified  companions,  and  that 
the  hurricane,  from  natural  causes,  sank  as  rapidly  as  it  had  arisen  ? 
I  reply,  that  if  this  were  the  only  miracle  in  the  life  of  Christ ;  if  the 
Gospels  were  indeed  the  loose,  exaggerated,  inaccurate,  credulous 
narratives  which  such  an  interpretation  would  suppose  ;  if  there  were 
something  antecedently  incredible  in  the  supernatural ;  if  there  were 
in  the  spiritual  world  no  transcendant  facts  which  lie  far  beyond 
the  comprehension  of  those  who  would  bid  us  see  nothing  in  the 
universe  but  the  action  of  material  laws  ;  if  there  were  no  providences 
of  God  during  these  nineteen  centuries  to  attest  the  work  and  the 
divinity  of  Christ — then  indeed  there  would  be  no  difficulty  in  such  an 
interpretation.  But  if  we  believe  that  God  rules ;  if  we  believe  that 
Christ  rose  ;  if  we  have  reason  to  hold,  among  the  deepest  convictions 
of  our  being,  the  certainty  that  God  has  not  delegated  His  sovereignty 
or  His  providence  to  the  final,  unintelligent,  pitiless,  inevitable  work- 
ing of  material  forces ;  if  we  see  on  every  page  of  the  Evangelists  the 
quiet  simplicity  of  truthful  and  faithful  witnesses  ;  if  we  see  in  every 
year  of  succeeding  history,  and  in  every  experience  of  individual 
life,  a  confirmation  of  the  testimony  which  they  delivered — then 
we  shall  neither  clutch  at  rationalistic  interpretations,  nor  be  much 
troubled  if  others  adopt  them.  He  who  believes,  he  who  knmvs,  the 
efficacy  of  prayer,  in  what  other  men  may  regard  as  the  inevitable 
certainties  or  blindly-directed  accidents  of  life — he  who  has  felt  how 
the  voice  of  a  Saviour,  heard  across  the  long  generations,  can  calm 
wilder  storms  than  ever  buffeted  into  fury  the  bosom  of  the  inland 
lake  —  he  who  sees  in  the  person  of  his  Redeemer  a  fact  more 


THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  155 

stupendous  and  more  majestic  than  all  those  observed  sequences 
which  men  endow  with  an  imaginary  omnipotence,  and  worship  tinder 
the  name  of  Law — to  him,  at  least,  there  will  be  neither  difficulty  nor 
hesitation  in  supposing  that  Christ,  on  board  that  half -wrecked  fishing- 
boat,  did  utter  His  mandate,  and  that  the  wind  and  the  sea  obeyed ; 
that  His  WORD  was  indeed  more  potent  among  the  cosmic  forces  than 
miles  of  agitated  water  or  leagues  of  rushing  air. 

Not  even  on  the  farther  shore  was  Jesus  to  find  peace  or  rest.  On 
the  contrary,  no  sooner  had  He  reached  that  part  of  Pereea  which  is 
called  by  St.  Matthew  the  "  country  of  the  Gergesenes,"  than  He  was 
met  by  an  exhibition  of  human  fury,  and  madness,  and  degradation, 
even  more  terrible  and  startling  than  the  rage  of  the  troubled  sea. 
Barely  had  He  landed  when,  from  among  the  rocky  cavern-tombs  of 
the  Wady  Semakh,  there  burst  into  His  presence  a  man  troubled  with 
the  most  exaggerated  form  of  that  raging  madness  which  was  uni- 
versally attributed  to  demoniacal  possession.  Amid  all  the  boasted  -, 
civilisation  of  antiquity,  there  existed  no  hospitals,  no  penitentiaries, 
no  asylums ;  and  unfortunates  of  this  class,  being  too  dangerous  and  / 
desperate  for  human  intercourse,  could  only  be  driven  forth  from 
among  their  fellow-men,  and  restrained  from  mischief  by  measures  at 
once  inadequate  and  cruel.  Under  such  circumstances  they  could,  if 
irreclaimable,  only  take  refuge  in  those  holes  along  the  rocky  hill-sides 
which  abound  in  Palestine,  and  which  were  used  by  the  Jews  as 
tombs.  It  is  clear  that  the  foul  and  polluted  nature  of  such  dwelling- 
places,  with  all  their  associations  of  ghastliness  and  terror,  would  tend 
to  aggravate  the  nature  of  the  malady ;  and  this  man,  who  had  long 
been  afflicted,  was  beyond  even  the  possibility  of  control.  Attempts 
had  been  made  to  bind  him,  but  in  the  paroxysms  of  his  mania  he  had 
exerted  that  apparently  supernatural  strength  which  is  often  noticed 
in  such  forms  of  mental  excitement,  and  had  always  succeeded  in 
rending  off  his  fetters  and  twisting  away  or  shattering  his  chains  ; 
and  now  he  had  been  abandoned  to  the  lonely  hills  and  unclean 
solitudes  which,  night  and  day,  rang  with  his  yells  as  he  wandered 
among  them,  dangerous  to  himself  and  to  others,  raving,  and  gashing 
himself  with  stones. 

It  was  the  frightful  figure  of  this  naked  and  homicidal  maniac  that 
burst  upon  our  Lord  almost  as  soon  as  He  had  landed  at  early  dawn ; 
and  perhaps  another  demoniac,  who  was  not  a  Qadarene,  and  who  was 
less  grievously  afflicted,  may  have  hovered  about  at  no  great  distance, 
although,  beyond  this  allusion  to  his  presence,  he  plays  no  part  in  the 


156  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

narrative.  The  presence,  the  look,  the  voice  of  Christ,  even  before  He 
addressed  these  sufferers,  seems  always  to  have  calmed  and  overawed 
them,  and  this  demoniac  of  Grergesa  was  no  exception.  Instead  of 
falling  upon  the  disciples,  he  ran  to  Jesus  from  a  distance,  and  fell 
down  before  Him  in  an  attitude  of  worship.  Mingling  his  own  per- 
turbed individuality  with  that  of  the  multitude  of  unclean  spirits  which 
he  believed  to  be  in  possession  of  His  soul,  he  entreated  the  Lord,  in 
loud  and  terrified  accents,  not  to  torment  him  before  the  time. 

It  is  well  known  that  to  recall  a  maniac's  attention  to  his  name,  to 
awake  his  memory,  to  touch  his  sympathies  by  past  association,  often 
produces  a  lucid  interval,  and  perhaps  this  may  have  been  the  reason 
why  Jesus  said  to  the  man,  "  What  is  thy  name  ?  "  But  this  question 
only  receives  the  wild  answer,  "  My  name  is  Legion,  for  we  are  many.'' 
The  man  had,  as  it  were,  lost  his  own  name ;  it  was  absorbed  in  the 
hideous  tyranny  of  that  multitude  of  demons  under  whose  influence 
his  own  personality  was  destroyed.  The  presence  of  Roman  armies  in 
Palestine  had  rendered  him  familiar  with  that  title  of  multitude,  and 
as  though  six  thousand  evil  spirits  were  in  him  he  answers  by  the  Latin 
word  which  had  now  become  so  familiar  to  every  Jew.  And  still 
agitated  by  his  own  perturbed  fancies,  he  entreats,  as  though  the  thou- 
sands of  demons  were  speaking  by  his  mouth,  that  they  might  not  be 
driven  into  the  abyss,  but  be  suffered  to  take  refuge  in  the  swine. 

The  narrative  which  follows  is  to  us  difficult  of  comprehension, 
and  one  which,  however  literally  accepted,  touches  upon  regions  so 
wholly  mysterious  and  unknown  that  we  have  no  clue  to  its  real 
significance,  and  can  gain  nothing  by  speculating  upon  it.  The 
narrative  in  St.  Luke  runs  as  follows  : — 

"  And  there  was  an  herd  of  many  swine  feeding  upon  the 
mountain;  and  they  besought  Him  that  He  would  suffer  them  to 
enter  into  them.  And  He  suffered  them.  Then  went  the  devils  out 
of  the  man,  and  entered  into  the  swine ;  and  the  herd  ran  violently 
down  a  steep  place  into  the  lake,  and  were  choked." 

That  the  demoniac  was  healed — that  in  the  terrible  final  paroxysm 
which  usually  accompanied  the  deliverance  from  this  strange  and 
awful  malady,  a  herd  of  swine  was  in  some  way  affected  with  such 
wild  terror  as  to  rush  headlong  in  large  numbers  over  a  steep  hill-side 
into  the  waters  of  the  lake — and  that,  in  the  minds  of  all  who  were 
present,  including  that  of  the  sufferer  himself,  this  precipitate  rushing 
of  the  swine  was  connected  with  the  man's  release  from  his  demoniac 
thraldom — thus  much  is  clear.  And  indeed,  so  far,  there  is  no 


THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  157 

difficulty  whatever.  Any  one  •who  believes  in  the  Gospels,  and 
believes  that  the  Son  of  God  did  work  on  earth  deeds  which  far 
surpass  mere  human  power,  must  believe  that  among  the  most  frequent 
of  His  cures  were  those  of  the  distressing  forms  of  mental  and  nervous 
malady  which  we  ascribe  to  purely  natural  causes,  but  which  the 
ancient  Jews,  like  all  Orientals,  attribute  to  direct  supernatural 
agency.  And  knowing  to  how  singular  an  extent  the  mental  im- 
pressions of  man  affect  by  some  unknown  electric  influence  the  lower 
animals — knowing,  for  instance,  that  man's  cowardice  and  exultation, 
and  even  his  superstitious  terrors,  do  communicate  themselves  to  the 
dog  which  accompanies  him,  or  the  horse  on  which  he  rides — there 
can  be  little  or  no  difficulty  in  understanding  that  the  shrieks  and 
gesticulations  of  a  powerful  lunatic  might  strike  uncontrollable  terror 
into  a  herd  of  swine.  We  know  further  that  the  spasm  of  deliverance 
was  often  attended  with  fearful  convulsions,  sometimes  perhaps  with 
an  effusion  of  blood  ;  and  we  know  that  the  sight  and  smell  of  human 
blood  produces  strange  effects  in  many  animals.  May  there  not  have 
been  something  of  this  kind  at  work  in  this  singular  event  ? 

It  is  true  that  the  Evangelists  (as  their  language  clearly  shows) 
held,  in  all  its  simplicity,  the  belief  that  actual  devils  passed  in  multi- 
tudes out  of  the  man  and  into  the  swine.  But  is  it  not  allowable  here 
to  make  a  distinction  between  actual  facts  and  that  which  was  the 
mere  conjecture  and  inference  of  the  spectators  from  whom  the  three 
Evangelists  heard  the  tale  ?  If  we  are  not  bound  to  believe  the  man's 
hallucination  that  six  thousand  devils  were  in  possession  of  his  soul, 
are  we  bound  to  believe  the  possibility,  suggested  by  his  perturbed 
intellect,  that  the  unclean  spirits  should  pass  from  him  into  the 
swine  ?  If  indeed  we  could  be  sure  that  Jesus  directly  encouraged 
or  sanctioned  in  the  man's  mind  the  belief  that  the  swine  were  indeed 
driven  wild  by  the  unclean  spirits  which  passed  objectively  from  the 
body  of  the  Gergesene  iuto  the  bodies  of  these  dumb  beasts,  then  we 
could,  without  hesitation,  believe  as  a  literal  truth,  however  incompre- 
hensible, that  so  it  was.  But  this  by  no  means  follows  indisputably 
from  what  we  know  of  the  method  of  the  Evangelists.  Let  all  who 
will,  hold  fast  to  the  conviction  that  men  and  beasts  may  be  quite 
literally  possessed  of  devils  ;  only  let  them  beware  of  confusing  their 
own  convictions,  which  are  binding  on  themselves  alone,  with  those 
absolute  and  eternal  certainties  which  cannot  be  rejected  without 
moral  blindness  by  others.  Let  them  remember  that  a  hard  and 
denunciative  dogmatism  approaches  more  nearly  than  anything  else  to 


158  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

that  Pharisaic  want  of  charity  which  the  Lord  whom  they  love  and 
worship  visited  with  His  most  scathing  anger  and  rebuke.  The 
literal  reality  of  demoniac  possession  is  a  belief  for  which  more  may 
perhaps  be  said  than  is  admitted  by  the  purely  physical  science  of  the 
present  day,  but  it  is  not  a  necessary  article  of  the  Christian  creed ; 
and  if  any  reader  imagines  that  in  this  brief  narrative,  to  a  greater 
extent  than  in  any  other,  there  are  certain  nuances  of  expression  in 
which  subjective  inferences  are  confused  with  exact  realities,  he  is 
holding  a  view  which  has  the  sanction  of  many  wise  and  thoughtful 
Churchmen,  andlias  a  right  to  do  so  without  the  slightest  imputation 
on  the  orthodoxy  of  his  belief. 

That  the  whole  scene  was  violent  and  startling  appears  in  the  fact 
that  the  keepers  of  the  swine  "fled  and  told  it  in  the  city  and 
in  the  country."  The  people  of  Gergesa,  and  the  Gadarenes  and 
Gerasenes  of  all  the  neighbouring  district,  nocked  out  to  see  the 
Mighty  Stranger  who  had  thus  visited  their  coasts.  What  livelier  or 
more  decisive  proof  of  His  power  and  His  beneficence  could  they  have 
had  than  the  sight  which  met  their  eyes  ?  The  filthy  and  frantic 
demoniac  who  had  been  the  terror  of  the-  country,  so  that  none  could 
pass  that  way — the  wild-eyed  dweller  in  the  tombs  who  had  been 
accustomed  to  gash  himself  with  cries  of  rage,  and  whose  untamed 
fierceness  broke  away  all  fetters — was  now  calm  as  a  child.  Some 
charitable  hand  had  flung  an  outer  robe  over  his  naked  figure,  and  he 
was  sitting  at  the  feet  of  Jesus,  clothed,  and  in  his  right  mind. 

"  And  they  were  afraid  " — more  afraid  of  that  Holy  Presence  than 
of  the  previous  furies  of  the  possessed.  The  man  indeed  was  saved ; 
but  what  of  that,  considering  that  some  of  their  two  thousand  unclean 
beasts  had  perished  !  Their  precious  swine  were  evidently  in  danger ; 
the  greed  and  gluttony  of  every  apostate  Jew  and  low-bred  Gentile  in 
the  place  were  clearly  imperilled  by  receiving  such  a  one  as  they  saw 
that  Jesus  was.  With  disgraceful  and  urgent  unanimity  they  entreated 
and  implored  Him  to  leave  their  coasts.  Both  heathens  and  Jews  had 
recognised  already  the  great  truth  that  God  sometimes  answers  bad 
prayers  in  His  deepest  anger.  Jesus  Himself  had  taught  His  dis- 
ciples not  to  give  that  which  was  holy  to  the  dogs,  neither  to  cast 
their  pearls  before  swine,  "  lest  they  trample  them  under  their  feet,  and 
torn  again  and  rend  you."  He  had  gone  across  the  lake  for  quiet  and 
rest,  desiring,  though  among  lesser  multitudes,  to  extend  to  these 
semi-heathens  also  the  blessings  of  the  kingdom  of  God.  But  they 
loved  their  sins  and  their  swine,  and  with  a  perfect  energy  of  delibe- 


THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  159 

rate  preference  for  all  that  was  base  and  mean,  rejected  such  blessings, 
and  entreated  Him  to  go  away.  Sadly,  but  at  once,  He  turned  and 
left  them.  Gergesa  was  no  place  for  Him ;  better  the  lonely  hill- tops 
to  the  north  of  it ;  better  the  crowded  strand  on  the  other  side. 

And  yet  He  did  not  leave  them  in  anger.  One  deed  of  mercy  had 
been  done  there ;  one  sinner  had  been  saved ;  from  one  soul  the  unclean 
spirits  had  been  cast  out.  And  just  as  the  united  multitude  of  the 
Gadarenes  had  entreated  for  His  absence,  so  the  poor  saved  demoniac 
entreated  henceforth  to  be  with  Him.  But  Jesus  would  fain  leave  one 
more,  one  last  opportunity  for  those  who  had  rejected  Him.  On  others 
for  whose  sake  miracles  had  been  performed  He  had  enjoined  silence  ; 
on  this  mau — since  He  was  now  leaving  the  place — he  enjoined  pub- 
licity. "  Go  home,"  He  said,  "  to  thy  friends,  and  tell  them  how  great 
things  the  Lord  hath  done  for  thee,  and  hath  had  compassion  on  thee." 
And  so  the  demoniac  of  Gergesa  became  the  first  great  missionary  to 
the  region  of  Decapolis,  bearing  in  his  own  person  the  confirmation  of 
his  words ;  and  Jesus,  as  His  little  vessel  left  the  inhospitable  shore, 
might  still  hope  that  the  day  might  not  be  far  distant — might  come,  at 
any  rate,  before  over  that  ill-fated  district  burst  the  storm  of  sword 
and  fire — when 

"  E'ea  the  witless  Gadareue, 
Preferring  Christ  to  swine,  would  feel 
That  life  is  sweetest  when  'tis  clean," 


CHAPTER    XXIV. 

THE   DAT   OF   MATTHEW'S    FEAST. 

THE  events  just  described  had  happened  apparently  in  the  early 
morning,  and  it  might  perhaps  be  noon  when  Jesus  reached  once 
more  the  Plain  of  Gennesareth.  People  had  recognised  the  sail  of 
His  returning  vessel,  and  long  before  He  reached  land  the  multitudes 
had  lined  the  shore,  and  were  waiting  for  Him,  and  received  Him 
gladly. 

If  we  may  here  accept  as  chronological  the  order  of  St.  Matthew — 
to  whom,  as   we  shall   see  hereafter,  this  must   have  been  a  very 


1GO  THE   LIFE    OF   CHBIST. 

memorable  day — Jesus  went  first  into  the  town  of  Capernaum,  which 
was  now  regarded  as  "  His  own  city."     He  went  at  once  to  the  house 
— probably  the  house  of  St.  Peter — which  He  ordinarily  used  when 
staying  at  Capernaum.      There  the  crowd  gathered  in  ever  denser 
numbers,  filling  the  house,  and  even  the  court-yard  which  surrounded 
it,  so  that  there  was  no  access  even  to  the  door.     But  there  was  one 
poor  sufferer — a  mad  bedridden  from  a  stroke  of  paralysis — who,  with 
his  friends,  had  absolutely  determined  that  access  should  be  made  for 
him;   he  would  be  one  of  those  violent  men  who   would  take  the 
kingdom  of  heaven  by  force.     And  the  four  who  were  carrying  him, 
finding  that  they  could  not  reach  Jesus  through  the  crowd,  made  their 
way  to  the  roof,  perhaps  by  the  usual  outer  staircase,  and  making  an 
aperture  in  the  roof  by  the  removal  of  a  few  tiles,  let  down   the 
paralytic,  on  his  humble  couch,  exactly  in  front  of  the  place  where 
Christ  was  sitting.     The  man  was  silent,  perhaps  awe-struck  at  his 
manner  of  intrusion  into  the  Lord's  presence ;  but  Jesus  was  pleased 
at  the  strength  and  unhesitating  boldness  of  faith  which  the  act  dis- 
played, and  bestowing  first  upon  the  man  a  richer  blessing  than  that 
which  he  primarily  sought,  He  gently  said  to  him,  as  He  had  said  to 
the  woman  who  was  a  sinner,  "Be  of  good  courage,  son;  thy  sins 
are  forgiven  thee."     Our  Lord  had  before  observed  the  unfavourable 
impression  produced  on  the  bystanders  by  those  startling  words.     He 
again  observed  it  now  in  the  interchanged  glances  of  the  Scribes  who 
were  present,  and  the  look  of  angry  disapproval  on  their  countenances. 
But  on  this  occasion  He  did  not,  as  before,  silently  substitute  another 
phrase.     On  the  contrary,  he  distinctly  challenged  attention  to  His 
words,  and  miraculously  justified  them.     Beading  their  thoughts,  He 
reproved  them  for  their  fierce  unuttered  calumnies  of  which  their 
hearts  were  full,  and  put  to  them  a  direct  question.     "  Which,"  He 
asked,  "  is  easier  ?   to  say  to   the  paralytic,  '  Thy  sins  are  forgiven 
thee ; '   or  to  say,  '  Arise  and  walk  ?  ' '      May  not  anybody  say  the 
former  without  its  being  possible  to  tell  whether  the  sins  are  forgiven 
or  not  ?  but  who  can  say  the  latter,  and  give  effect  to  his  own  words, 
without  a  power  from  above  ?     If  I  can  by  a  word  heal  this  paralytic, 
is  it  not  clear  that  I  must  be  One  who  has  also  power  on  earth  to 
forgive   sins  ?      The  unanswerable   question  was  received  with  the 
silence  of  an  invincible  obstinacy ;    but  turning  once  more   to   the 
paralytic,  Jesus  said  to  him,  "  Arise,  take  up  thy  bed,  and  walk."     At 
once  power  was  restored  to  the  palsied  limbs,  peace  to  the  stricken 
soul.     The  man  was  healed.     He  rose,  lifted  the  light  couch  on  which 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  161 

he  had  been  lying,  and,  while  now  the  crowd  opened  a  passage  for 
him,  he  went  to  his  house  glorifying  God;  and  the  multitude,  when 
they  broke  up  to  disperse,  kept  exchanging  one  with  another  exclama- 
tions of  astonishment  not  unmixed  with  fear,  "  We  saw  strange  things 
to-day !"  "We  never  saw  anything  like  this  before !  " 

From  the  house — perhaps  to  allow  of  more  listeners  hearing  His 
words — Jesus  seems  to  have  adjourned  to  His  favourite  shore ;  and 
thence,  after  a  brief  interval  of  teaching,  He  repaired  to  the  house  of 
Matthew,  in  which  the  publican,  who  was  now  an  Apostle,  had  made 
a  great  feast  of  farewell  to  all  his  friends.  As  he  had  been  a  publican 
himself,  it  was  natural  that  many  of  these  also  would  be  "  publicans 
and  sinners  "- — the  outcasts  of  society,  objects  at  once  of  hatred  and 
contempt.  Yet  Jesus  and  His  disciples,  with  no  touch  of  scorn  or 
exclusiveness,  sat  down  with  them  at  the  feast :  "  for  there  were  many, 
and  they  were  His  followers."  A  charity  so  liberal  caused  deep  dis- 
satisfaction, on  two  grounds,  to  two  powerful  bodies — the  Pharisees 
and  the  disciples  of  John.  To  the  former,  mainly  because  this  contact 
with  men  of  careless  and  evil  lives  violated  all  the  traditions  of  their 
haughty  scrupulosity ;  to  the  latter,  because  this  ready  acceptance  of 
invitations  to  scenes  of  feasting  seemed  to  discountenance  the  necessity 
for  their  half-Essenian  asceticism.  The  complaints  could  hardly  have 
been  made  at  the  time,  for  unless  any  Pharisees  or  disciples  of  John 
merely  looked  in  from  curiosity  during  the  progress  of  the  meal,  their 
own  presence  there  would  have  involved  them  in  the  very  blame  which 
they  were  casting  on  their  Lord.  But  Jesus  probably  heard  of  their 
murmurs  before  the  feast  was  over.  There  was  something  charac- 
teristic in  the  way  in  which  the  criticism  was  made.  The  Pharisees, 
still  a  little  dubious  as  to  Christ's  real  character  and  mission,  evidently 
overawed  by  His  greatness,  and  not  yet  having  ventured  upon  any 
open  rupture  with  Him,  only  vented  their  ill-humour  on  the  disciples, 
asking  them,  "  why  their  Master  ate  with  publicans  and  sinners  ?  "  The 
simple-minded  Apostles  were  perhaps  unable  to  explain ;  but  Jesus  at 
once  faced  the  opposition,  and  told  these  murmuring  respectabilities 
that  He  came  not  to  the  self-righteous,  but  to  the  conscious  sinners. 
He  came  not  to  the  folded  flock,  but  to  the  straying  sheep.  To  preach 
the  Gospel  to  the  poor,  to  extend  mercy  to  the  lost,  was  the  very  object 
for  which  He  tabernacled  among  men.  It  was  His  will  not  to  thrust 
His  grace  on  those  who  from  the  very  first  wilfully  steeled  their  hearts 
against  it,  but  gently  to  extend  it  to  those  who  needed  and  felt  their 
need  of  it.  His  teaching  was  to  be  "  as  the  small  rain  npon  the  tender 

M 


162  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

herb,  and  as  the  showers  upon  the  grass."  And  then,  referring  them? 
to  one  of  those  palmary  passages  of  the  Old  Testament  (Hos.  vi.  6) 
which  even  in  those  days  had  snmmed  up  the  very  essence  of  all  that 
was  pleasing  to  God  in  love  and  mercy,  He  borrowed  the  phrase  of 
their  own  Rabbis,  and  bade  them — these  teachers  of  the  people,  who 
claimed  to  know  so  much — to  "  go  and  learn  "  what  that  meaneth, 
"  I  will  have  mercy,  and  not  sacrifice."  Perhaps  it  had  never  before- 
occurred  to  their  astonished  minds,  overlaid  as  they  were  by  a  crust  of 
mere  Nevitism  and  tradition,  that  the  love  which  thinks  it  no  con- 
descension to  mingle  with  sinners  in  the  effort  to  win  their  souls,  is- 
more  pleasing  to  God  than  thousands  of  rams  and  tens  of  thousands  of 
rivers  of  oil. 

The  answer  to  the  somewhat  querulous  question  asked  Him  by 
John's  disciples  was  less  severe  in  tone.  No  doubt  He  pitied  that 
natural  dejection  of  mind  which  arose  from  the  position  of  the  great 
teacher,  to  whom  alone  they  had  as  yet  learned  to  look,  and  who  now 
lay  in  the  dreary  misery  of  a  Machserus  dungeon.  He  might  have 
answered  that  fasting  was  at  the  best  a  work  of  supererogation — 
useful,  indeed,  and  obligatory,  if  any  man  felt  that  thereby  he  was 
assisted  in  the  mortification  of  anything  which  was  evil  in  his  nature — 
but  worse  than  useless  if  it  merely  ministered  to  his  spiritual  pride, 
and  led  him  to  despise  others.  He  might  have  pointed  out  to  them 
that  although  they  had  instituted  a  fast  twice  in  the  week,  this  was 
but  a  traditional  institution,  so  little  sanctioned  by  the  Mosaic  law, 
that  in  it  but  one  single  day  of  fasting  was  appointed  for  the  entire 
year.  He  might,  too,  have  added  that  the  reason  why  fasting  had 
not  been  made  a  universal  duty  is  probably  that  spirit  of  mercy  which 
recognised  how  differently  it  worked  upon  different  temperaments, 
fortifying  some  against  the  attacks  of  temptations,  but  only  hindering 
others  in  the  accomplishment  of  duty.  Or  again,  He  might  have 
referred  them  to  those  passages  in  their  own  Prophets  which  pointed 
out  that,  in  the  sight  of  God,  the  true  fasting  is  not  mere  abstinence 
from  food,  while  all  the  time  the  man  is  "smiting  with  the  fist  of 
wickedness ;  "  but  rather  to  love  mercy,  and  to  do  justice,  and  to  let 
the  oppressed  go  free.  But  instead  of  all  these  lessons,  which,  in 
their  present  state,  might  only  have  exasperated  their  prejudices,  He 
answers  them  only  by  a  gentle  argumentum,  ad  hominem.  Referring 
to  the  fine  image  in  which  their  own  beloved  and  revered  teacher 
had  spoken  of  Him  as  the  bridegroom,  He  contented  Himself  with 
asking  them,  "Can  ye  make  the  children  of  the  bridechamber  fast  while 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  163 

the  bridegroom  is  with  them  ?  "  and  then,  looking  calmly  down  at  the 
deep  abyss  which  yawned  before  Him,  He  uttered  a  saying  which — 
although  at  that  time  none  probably  understood  it — was  perhaps  the 
very  earliest  public  intimation  that  He  gave  of  the  violent  end  which 
awaited  Him — "But  the  days  will  come  when  the  bridegroom  shall  be 
taken  away  from  them,  and  then  shall  they  fast  in  those  days." 
Further  He  told  them,  in  words  of  yet  deeper  significance,  though  ex- 
pressed, as  so  often,  in  the  homeliest  metaphors,  that  His  religion  is, 
as  it  were,  a  robe  entirely  new,  not  a  patch  of  unteazled  cloth  upon  an 
old  robe,  serving  only  to  make  worse  its  original  rents  ;  that  it  is  not 
new  wine,  put,  in  all  its  fresh  fermenting,  expansive  strength,  into  old 
and  worn  wine-skins,  and  so  serving  only  to  burst  the  wine-skins  and 
be  lost,  but  new  wine  in  fresh  wine-skins.  The  new  spirit  was  to  be 
embodied  in  wholly  renovated  forms  ;  the  new  freedom  was  to  be 
untrammelled  by  obsolete  and  meaningless  limitations ;  the  spiritual 
doctrine  was  to  be  sundered  for  ever  from  mere  elaborate  and  external 
ceremonials. 

St.  Luke  also  has  preserved  for  us  the  tender  and  remarkable 
addition — "  No  man  also  having  drunk  old  wine  straightway  desire th 
new  :  for  he  saith,  The  old  is  excellent."  Perhaps  the  fact  that  these 
words  were  found  to  be  obscure  has  caused  the  variety  of  readings  in 
the  original  text.  There  is  nothing  less  like  the  ordinary  character  of 
man  than  to  make  allowance  for  difference  of  opinion  in  matters  of 
religion  ;  yet  it  is  the  duty  of  doing  this  which  the  words  imply.  He 
had  been  showing  them  that  His  kingdom  was  something  more  than  a 
restitution  (aTroKardaraa'is),  it  was  a  re-creation  (Trahvyyevea-la)  •  but 
He  knew  how  hard  it  was  for  men  trained  in  the  tradition  of  the 
Pharisees,  and  in  admiration  for  the  noble  asceticism  of  the  Baptist,  to 
accept  truths  which  were  to  them  both  new  and  strange  ;  and,  there- 
fore, even  when  He  is  endeavouring  to  lighten  their  darkness,  He 
shows  that  He  can  look  on  them  "  with  larger  other  eyes,  to  make 
allowance  for  them  all." 


CHAPTER  XXV. 

THIS   DAT   OF   MATTHEW'S    FEAST    (continued). 

THE  feast  was  scarcely  over  at  the  house  of  Matthew,  and  Jesus  was 
still  engaged  in  the  kindly  teaching  which  arose  out  of  the  question  of 

Jt  2 


164  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

John's  disciples,  when  another  event  occurred  which  led  in  succession 
to  three  of  the  greatest  miracles  of  His  earthly  life. 

A  ruler  of  the  synagogue — the  rosh  halcJceneseth,  or  chief  elder  of 
the  congregation,  to  whom  the  Jews  looked  with  great  respect — came 
to  Jesus  in  extreme  agitation.  It  is  not  improbable  that  this  ruler  of 
the  synagogue  had  been  one  of  the  very  deputation  who  had  pleaded 
with  Jesus  for  the  centurion-proselyte  by  whom  it  had  been  built. 
If  so,  he  knew  by  experience  the  power  of  Him  to  whom  he  now 
appealed.  Flinging  himself  at  His  feet  with  broken  words — which  in 
the  original  still  sound  as  though  they  were  interrupted  and  rendered 
incoherent  by  bursts  of  grief — he  tells  Him  that  his  little  daughter, 
his  only  daughter,  is  dying,  is  dead ;  but  still,  if  He  will  but  come  and 
lay  His  hand  upon  her,  she  shall  live.  With  the  tenderness  which 
could  not  be  deaf  to  a  mourner's  cry,  Jesus  rose  at  once  from  the 
table,  and  went  with  him,  followed  not  only  by  His  disciples,  but  also 
by  a  dense  expectant  multitude,  which  had  been  witness  of  the  scene. 
And  as  He  went  the  people  in  their  eagerness  pressed  upon  Him  and 
thronged  Him. 

But  among  this  throng — containing  doubtless  some  of  the  Pharisees 
and  of  John's  disciples  with  whom  He  had  been  discoursing,  as  well 
as  some  of  the  publicans  and  sinners  with  whom  He  had  been  seated 
at  the  feast — there  was  one  who  had  not  been  attracted  by  curiosity  to 
witness  what  would  be  done  for  the  ruler  of  the  synagogue.  It 
was  a  woman  who  for  twelve  years  had  suffered  from  a  distressing 
malady,  which  unfitted  her  for  all  the  relationships  of  life,  and 
which  was  peculiarly  afflicting,  because  in  the  popular  mind  it  was 
regarded  as  a  direct  consequence  of  sinful  habits.  In  vain  had  she 
wasted  her  substance  and  done  fresh  injury  to  her  health  in  the  effort 
to  procure  relief  from  many  different  physicians,  and  now,  as  a  last 
desperate  resource,  she  would  try  what  could  be  gained  without 
money  and  without  price  from  the  Great  Physician.  Perhaps,  in 
her  ignorance,  it  was  because  she  had  no  longer  any  reward  to  offer ; 
perhaps  because  she  was  ashamed  in  her  feminine  modesty  to  reveal 
the  malady  from  which  she  had  been  suffering;  but  from  whatever 
cause,  she  determined,  as  it  were,  to  steal  from  Him,  unknown,  the 
blessing  for  which  she  longed.  And  so,  with  the  strength  and  perti- 
nacity of  despair,  she  struggled  in  that  dense  throng  until  she  was 
near  enough  to  touch  him;  and  then,  perhaps  all  the  more  violently 
from  her  extreme  nervousness,  she  grasped  the  white  fringe  of  His 
robe.  By  the  law  of  Moses  every  Jew  was  to  wear  at  each  corner  of 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  165 

his  tallitli  a  fringe  or  tassel,  bound  by  a  riband  of  symbolic  blue,  to 
remind  him  that  he  was  holy  to  God.  Two  of  these  fringes  usually 
hung  down  at  the  bottom  of  the  robe ;  one  hung  over  the  shoulder 
where  the  robe  was  folded  round  the  person.  It  was  probably  this 
one  that  she  touched  with  secret  and  trembling  haste,  and  then, 
feeling  instantly  that  she  had  gained  her  desire  and  was  healed,  she 
shrank  back  unnoticed  into  the  throng.  Unnoticed  by  others,  but  not 
by  Christ.  Perceiving  that  healing  power  had  gone  out  of  Him, 
recognizing  the  one  magnetic  touch  of  timid  faith  even  amid  the 
pressure  of  the  crowd,  He  stopped  and  asked.  "Who  touched  my 
clothes  ?"  There  was  something  almost  impatient  in  the  reply  of 
Peter,  as  though  in  such  a  throng  he  thought  it  absurd  to  ask,  "Who 
touched  me?"  But  Jesus,  His  eyes  still  wandering  over  the  many 
faces,  told  him  that  there  was  a  difference  between  the  crowding  of 
curiosity  and  the  touch  of  faith,  and  as  at  last  His  glance  fell  on  the 
poor  woman,  she,  perceiving  that  she  had  erred  in  trying  to  filch  the 
blessing  which  He  would  have  graciously  bestowed,  came  for\vard 
fearing  and  trembling,  and,  flinging  herself  at  His  feet,  told  Him  all 
the  truth.  All  her  feminine  shame  and  fear  were  forgotten  in  her 
desire  to  atone  for  her  fault.  Doubtless  she  dreaded  His  anger,  for 
the  law  expressly  ordained  that  the  touch  of  one  afflicted  as  she  was> 
caused  ceremonial  uncleanness  till  the  evening.  But  His  touch  had 
cleansed  her,  not  her's  polluted  Him.  So  far  from  being  indignant, 
He  said  to  her,  "Daughter" — and  at  once  at  the  sound  of  that 
gracious  word  sealed  her  pardon — "  go  for  peace :  thy  faith  hath  saved 
thee ;  be  healed  from  thy  disease." 

The  incident  must  have  caused  a  brief  delay,  and,  as  we  have  seen,  to 
the  anguish  of  Jairns  every  instant  was  critical.  But  he  was  not  the 
only  sufferer  who  had  a  claim  on  the  Saviour's  mercy ;  and,  as  he 
uttered  no  complaint,  it  is  clear  that  sorrow  had  not  made  him  selfish. 
But  at  this  moment  a  messenger  reached  him  with  the  brief  message — 
"Thy  daughter  is  dead;"  and  then,  apparently  with  a  touch  of  dislike 
and  irony,  he  added,  "Worry  not  the  Rabbi." 

The  message  had  not  been  addressed  to  Jesus,  but  He  overheard 
it,  and  with  a  compassionate  desire  to  spare  the  poor  father  from 
needless  ngony,  He  said  to  him  those  memorable  words,  "  Fear  not, 
only  believe."  They  soon  arrived  at  his  house,  and  found  it  occupied 
by  the  hired  mourners  and  flute-players,  who,  as  they  beat  their 
breasts,  with  mercenary  clamour,  insulted  the  dumbness  of  sincere 
sorrow  and  the  patient  majesty  of  death.  Probably  this  simulated 


166  THE   LIFE   OP  CHRIST. 

wailing  would  be  very  repulsive  to  the  soul  of  Christ;  and,  first 
stopping  at  the  door  to  forbid  any  of  the  multitude  to  follow  Him,  He 
entered  the  house  with  three  only  of  the  inmost  circle  of  His  Apostles 
— Peter,  and  James,  and  John.  On  entering,  His  first  care  was  to  still 
the  idle  noise  ;  but  when  His  kind  declaration — "  The  little  maid  is 
not  dead,  but  sleepeth" — was  only  received  with  coarse  ridicule,  He 
indignantly  ejected  the  paid  mourners.  When  calm  was  restored,  He 
took  with  him  the  father  and  the  mother  and  His  three  Apostles,  and 
entered  with  quiet  reverence  the  chamber  hallowed  by  the  silence  and 
awfulness  of  death.  Then,  taking  the  little  cold  dead  hand,  He 
tittered  these  two  thrilling  words,  "  Tcditha  cumi " — "  Little  maid, 
arise  !  "  and  her  spirit  returned,  and  the  child  arose  and  walked.  An 
awful  amazement  seized  the  parents ;  but  Jesus  calmly  bade  them 
give  the  child  some  food.  And  if  He  added  His  customary  warning 
that  they  should  not  speak  of  what  had  happened,  ic  was  not  evidently 
in  the  intention  that  the  entire  fact  should  remain  unknown — for  that 
would  have  been  impossible,  when  all  the  circumstances  had  been 
witnessed  by  so  many — but  because  those  who  have  received  from 
God's  hand  unbounded  mercy  are  more  likely  to  reverence  that  mercy 
with  adoring  gi-atitude  if  it  be  kept  like  a  hidden  treasure  in  the 
inmost  heart. 

Crowded  and  overwhelming  as  had  been  the  incidents  of  this  long 
night  and  day,  it  seems  probable  from  St.  Matthew  that  it  was 
signalised  by  yet  one  more  astonishing  work  of  power.  For  as  He 
departed  thence  two  blind  men  followed  Him  with  the  cry — as  yet 
unheard — "  Son  of  David,  have  mercy  on  us."  Already  Christ  had 
begun  to  check,  as  it  were,  the  spontaneity  of  His  miracles.  He  had 
performed  more  than  sufficient  to  attest  His  power  and  mission,  and 
it  was  important  that  men  should  pay  more  heed  •  to  His  divine 
eternal  teaching  than  to  His  temporal  healings.  Nor  would  He  as 
yet  sanction  the  premature,  and  perhaps  ill-considered,  use  of  the 
Messianic  title  "  Son  of  David " — a  title  which,  had  He  publicly 
accepted  it,  might  have  thwarted  His  sacred  purposes,  by  leading  to 
an  instantaneous  revolt  in  His  favour  against  the  Roman  power. 
Without  noticing  the  men  or  their  cry,  Ho  went  to  the  house  in 
Capernaum  where  He  abode ;  nor  was  it  until  they  had  persistently 
followed  Him  into  the  honse  that  Ho  tested  their  faith  by  the  question, 
"Believe  ye  that  I  am  able  to  do  this  ?  "  They  said  unto  Him,  "Yea, 
Lord."  Then  touched  He  their  eyes,  saying,  "According  to  your 
faith  be  it  unto  yon."  And  their  eyes  were  opened.  Like  so  many 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  1G7 

•whom  He  healed,  they  neglected  His  stern  command  not  to  repeal  it. 
There  are  some  who  have  admired  their  disobedience,  and  have  attri- 
buted it  to  the  enthusiasm  of  gratitude  and  admiration ;  but  was  it 
not  rather  the  enthusiasm  of  a  blatant  wonder,  the  vulgarity  of  a 
chattering  boast  ?  How  many  of  these  multitudes  who  had  been 
healed  by  Him  became  His  true  disciples  ?  Did  not  the  holy  fire  of 
•devotion  which  a  hallowed  silence  must  have  kept  alive  upon  the  altar 
of  their  hearts  die  away  in  the  mere  blaze  of  empty  rumour  ?  Did 
•not  he  know  best  ?  Would  not  obedience  have  been  better  than 
sacrifice,  and  to  hearken  than  the  fat  of  rams  ?  Yes.  It  is  possible 
to  deceive  ourselves  ;  it  is  possible  to  offer  to  Christ  a  seeming  service 
which  disobeys  His  inmost  precepts — to  grieve  Him,  under  the  guise 
of  honouring  Him,  by  vain  repetitions,  and  empty  genuflexions,  and 
bitter  intolerance,  and  irreverent  familiarity,  and  the  hollow  simu- 
lacrum of  a  dead  devotion.  Better,  far  better,  to  serve  Him  by  doing 
the  things  He  said  than  by  a  seeming  zeal,  often  false  in  exact  propor- 
tion to  its  obtrusiveness,  for  the  glory  of  His  name.  These  disobedient 
babblers,  who  talked  so  much  of  Him,  did  but  offer  Him  the  dis- 
honouring service  of  a  double  heart ;  their  violation  of  His  command- 
ment served  only  to  hinder  His  usefulness,  to  trouble  His  spirit,  and 
io  precipitate  His  death. 


CHAPTER  XXVI. 

A     VISIT     TO     JERUSALEM. 

ANY  one  who  has  carefully  and  repeatedly  studied  the  Gospel  narratives 
«ide  by  side,  in  order  to  form  from  them  as  clear  a  conception  as  is 
possible  of  the  life  of  Christ  on  earth,  can  hardly  fail  to  have  been 
struck  with  two  or  three  general  facts  respecting  the  sequence  of 
•events  in  His  public  ministry.  In  spite  of  the  difficulty  introduced  by 
the  varying  and  non-chronological  arrangements  of  the  Synoptists, 
and  by  the  silence  of  the  fourth  Gospel  about  the  main  part  of  the 
preaching  in  Galilee,  we  see  distinctly  the  following  circumstances : — 
1.  That  the  innocent  enthusiasm  of  joyous  welcome  with  which 
Jesus  and  His  words  and  works  were  at  first  received  in  Northern 


168  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

Galilee  gradually,  but  in  a  short  space  of  time,  gave  way  to  suspicion,, 
dislike,  and  even  hostility  on  the  part  of  large  and  powerful  sections 
of  the  people. 

2.  That  the  external  character,  as  well  as  the  localities,  of  our 
Lord's   mission   were  much   altered  after  the  murder   of   John   the 
Baptist. 

3.  That  the  tidings  of  this  murder,  together  with  a  marked  develop- 
ment of  opposition,  and  the  constant  presence  of  Scribes  and  Pharisees 
from  Judaea  to  watch  His  conduct  and  dog  His  movements,  seems  to 
synchronise  with  a  visit  to  Jerusalem  not  recorded  by  the  Synoptists, 
but   evidently  identical    with  the    nameless    festival    mentioned   in 
John  v.  1. 

4.  That  this   unnamed  festival  must  have   occurred    somewhere 
about  that  period  of  His  ministry  at  which  we  have  now  arrived. 

What  this  feast  was  we  shall  consider  immediately ;  but  it  was 
preceded  by  another  event — the  mission  of  the  Twelve  Apostles. 

At  the  close  of  the  missionary  journeys,  during  which  occurred 
some  of  the  events  described  in  the  last  chapters,  Jesus  was  struck 
with  compassion  at  the  sight  of  the  multitude.  They  reminded  Him 
of  sheep  harassed  by  enemies,  and  lying  panting  and  neglected  in  the 
fields  because  they  have  no  shepherd.  They  also  called  up  to  the  mind 
the  image  of  a  harvest  ripe,  but  unreaped  for  lack  of  labourers ;  and 
He  bade  His  Apostles  pray  to  the  Lord  of  the  harvest  that  He  would 
send  forth  labourers  into  His  harvest.  And  then,  immediately  after- 
wards, having  Himself  now  traversed  the  whole  of  Galilee,  He  sent 
them  out  two  and  two  to  confirm  His  teaching  and  perform  works  of 
mercy  in  His  name. 

Before  sending  them  He  naturally  gave  them  the  instructions 
which  were  to  guide  their  conduct.  At  present  they  were  to  confine 
their  mission  to  the  lost  sheep  of  the  house  of  Israel,  and  not  extend  it 
to  Samaritans  or  Gentiles.  The  topic  of  their  preaching  was  to  be  the 
nearness  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  and  it  was  to  be  freely  supported 
by  works  of  power  and  beneficence.  They  were  to  take  nothing  with 
them  ;  no  scrip  for  food  ;  no  purse  for  money ;  no  change  of  raiment ; 
no  travelling  shoes  (vTroBifaara,  calcc.i),  in  place  of  their  ordinary 
palm-bark  sandals,  they  were  not  even  to  procure  a  staff  for  the 
journey  if  they  did  not  happen  already  to  possess  one ;  their  mission 
— like  all  the  greatest  and  most  effective  missions  which  the  world  has 
ever  known — was  to  be  simple  and  self-supporting.  The  open  hospi- 
tality of  the  East,  so  often  used  as  the  basis  for  a  dissemination  of  new 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  1GD 

thoughts,  -would  be  ample  for  their  maintenance.  On  entering  a  town 
they  were  to  go  to  any  house  in  it  where  they  had  reason  to  hope  that 
they  would  be  welcome,  and  to  salute  it  with  the  immemorial  and 
much- valued  blessing,  Shalom  lakem,  "  Peace  be  to  you,"  and  if  the 
children  of  peace  were  there  the  blessing  would  be  effective  ;  if  not,  it 
would  return  on  their  own  heads.  If  rejected,  they  were  to  shake  off 
the  dust  of  their  feet  in  witness  that  they  had  spoken  faithfully,  and 
that  they  thus  symbolically  cleared  themselves  of  all  responsibility  for 
that  judgment  which  should  fall  more  heavily  on  wilful  and  final  haters 
of  the  light  than  on  the  darkest  places  of  a  heathendom  in  which  the 
light  had  never,  or  but  feebly,  shone. 

So  far  their  Lord  had  pointed  out  to  them  the  duties  of  trustful 
faith,  of  gentle  courtesy,  of  self-denying  simplicity,  as  the  first  essentials 
of  missionary  success.  He  proceeded  to  fortify  them  against  the  inevit- 
able trials  and  persecutions  of  their  missionary  work. 

They  needed  and  were  to  exercise  the  wisdom  of  serpents  no  less 
than  the  harmlessness  of  doves :  for  He  was  sending  them  forth  as 
sheep  among  wolves. 

Doubtless  these  discourses  were  not  always  delivered  in  the  con- 
tinuous form  in  which  they  have  naturally  come  down  to  us.  Our 
Lord  seems  at  all  times  to  have  graciously  encouraged  the  questions  of 
humble  and  earnest  listeners ;  and  at  this  point  we  are  told  by  an 
ancient  tradition,  that  St.  Peter — ever,  we  may  be  sure,  a  most  eager 
and  active-minded  listener — interrupted  his  Master  with  the  not 
unnatural  question,  "  But  how  then  if  the  wolves  should  tear  the 
lambs  ?  "  And  Jesus  answered,  smiling  perhaps  at  the  naive  and 
literal  intellect  of  His  chief  Apostle,  "Let  not  the  lambs  fear  the 
wolves  when  the  lambs  are  once  dead,  and  do  you  fear  not  those  who 
can  kill  you  and  do  nothing  to  you,  but  fear  Him  who  after  you 
are  dead  hath  power  over  soul  and  body  to  cast  them  into  hell-fire." 
And  then,  continuing  the  thread  of  His  discourse,  He  warned  them 
plainly  how,  both  at  this  time  and  again  long  afterwards,  they  might 
be  brought  before  councils,  and  scourged  in  synagogues,  and  stand  at 
the  judgment-bar  of  kings,  and  yet,  without  any  anxious  premeditation, 
the  Spirit  should  teach  them  what  to  say.  The  doctrine  of  peace 
should  be  changed  by  the  evil  passions  of  men  into  a  war-cry  of  fury 
and  hate,  and  they  might  be  driven  to  fly  before  the  face  of  enemies 
from  city  to  city.  Still  let  them  endure  to  the  end,  for  before  they  had 
gone  through  the  cities  of  Israel,  the  Son  of  Man  should  have  come. 
Then,  lastly,  He  at  once  warned  and  comforted  them  by  reminding 


170  THE   LIFE    OP  CHRIST. 

them  of  what  He  Himself  had  suffered,  and  how  He  had  been  opposed. 
Let  them  not  fear.  The  God  who  cared  even  for  the  little  birds  when 
they  fell  to  the  ground — the  God  by  whom  the  very  hairs  of  their 
head  were  numbered — the  God  who  (and  here  He  glanced  back 
perhaps  at  the  question  of  Peter)  held  in  His  hand  the  issues,  not  of 
life  and  death  only,  but  of  eternal  life  and  of  eternal  death,  and  who 
was  therefore  more  to  be  feared  than  the  wolves  of  earth — HE  was 
with  them ;  He  would  acknowledge  those  whom  His  Son  acknow- 
ledged, and  deny  those  whom  He  denied.  They  were  being  sent  forth 
into  a  world  of  strife,  which  would  seem  even  the  more  deadly  because 
of  the  peace  which  it  rejected.  Even  their  nearest  and  their  dearest 
might  side  with  the  world  against  them.  But  they  who  would  be 
His  true  followers  must  for  His  sake  give  up  all ;  must  even  take  up 
their  cross  and  follow  Him.  But  then,  for  their  comfort,  He  told 
them  that  they  should  be  as  He  was  in  the  world ;  that  they  who 
received  them  should  receive  Him ;  that  to  lose  their  lives  for  His 
sake  would  be  to  more  than  find  them  ;  that  a  cup  of  cold  water  given 
to  the  youngest  and  humblest  of  His  little  ones  should  not  miss  of  its 
reward. 

Such  is  an  outline  of  these  great  parting  instructions  as  given  by 
St.  Matthew,  and  every  missionary  and  every  minister  should  write 
them  in  letters  of  gold.  The  sterility  of  missionary  labour  is  a  con- 
stant subject  of  regret  and  discouragement  among  us.  Would  it  be  so 
if  all  our  missions  were  carried  out  in  this  wise  and  conciliatory,  in 
this  simple  and  self -abandoning,  in  this  faithful  and  dauntless  spirit  ? 
Was  a  missionary  ever  unsuccessful  who,  being  enabled  by  the  grace 
of  God  to  live  in  the  light  of  such  precepts  as  these,  worked  as  St. 
Paul  worked,  or  St.  Francis  Xavier,  or  Henry  Martyn,  or  Adoniram 
Judson,  or  John  Eliot,  or  David  Schwarz  ? 

That  the  whole  of  this  discourse  was  not  delivered  on  this  occasion, 
that  there  are  references  in  it  to  later  periods,  that  parts  of  it  are  only 
applicable  to  other  apostolic  missions  which  as  yet  lay  far  in  the  future, 
seems  clear ;  but  we  may,  nevertheless,  be  grateful  that  St.  Matthew, 
guided  as  usual  by  unity  of  subject,  collected  into  one  focus  the  scat- 
tered rays  of  instruction  delivered,  perhaps,  on  several  subsequent 
occasions — as  for  instance,  before  the  sending  of  the  Seventy,  and  even 
AS  the  parting  utterances  of  the  risen  Christ. 

The  Jews  were  familiar  with  the  institution  of  Sliduclwm,  the 
plenipotentiaries  of  Borne  higher  authority.  This  was  the  title  by 
which  Christ  seems  to  have  marked  out  the  position  of  His  Apostles. 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  171 

It  was  a  wise  and  merciful  provision  that  He  sent  them  out  two  and 
two ;  it  enabled  them  to  hold  sweet  converse  together,  and  mutually 
to  correct  each  other's  faults.  Doubtless  the  friends  and  the  brothers 
went  in  pairs ;  the  fiery  Peter  with  the  more  contemplative  Andrew ; 
the  Sons  of  Thunder — one  influential  and  commanding,  the  other 
emotional  and  eloquent ;  the  kindred  faith  and  guilelessness  of  Philip 
and  Bartholomew ;  the  slow  but  faithful  Thomas  with  the  thoughtful 
and  devoted  Matthew ;  the  ascetic  James  with  his  brother  the  impas- 
sioned Jude ;  the  zealot  Simon  to  fire  with  his  theocratic  zeal  the  dark, 
flagging,  despairing  spirit  of  the  traitor  Judas. 

During  their  absence  Jesus  continued  his  work  alone,  perhaps  as 
He  slowly  made  His  way  towards  Jerusalem ;  for  if  we  can  speak  of 
probability  at  all  amid  the  deep  uncertainties  of  the  chronology  of  His 
ministry,  it  seems  extremely  probable  that  it  is  to  this  point  that  the 
verse  belongs — "After  this  there  was  a  feast  of  the  Jews,  and  Jesus 
went  up  to  Jerusalem."  This  nameless  feast  was  in  all  probability  the 
Feast  of  Purim. 

But  how  came  Jesus  to  go  up  to  Jerusalem  for  such  a  feast  as  this 
— a  feast  which  was  the  saturnalia  of  Judaism ;  a  feast  which  was 
without  divine  authority,  and  had  its  roots  in  the  most  intensely 
exclusive,  not  to  say  vindictive,  feelings  of  the  nation;  a  feast  of 
merriment  and  masquerade,  which  was  purely  social  and  often  dis- 
creditably convivial;  a  feast  which  was  unconnected  with  religions 
services,  and  was  observed,  not  in  the  Temple,  not  even  necessarily  in 
the  synagogues,  but  mainly  in  the  private  houses  of  the  Jews  ? 

The  answer  seems  to  be  that,  although  Jesus  was  in  Jerusalem  at 
this  feast,  and  went  up  about  the  time  that  it  was  held,  the  words  of 
St.  John  do  not  necessarily  imply  that  He  went  up  for  the  express 
purpose  of  being  present  at  this  particular  festival.  The  Passover 
took  place  only  a  month  afterwards,  and  He  may  well  have  gone  up 
mainly  with  the  intention  of  being  present  at  the  Passover,  although 
He  gladly  availed  Himself  of  an  opportunity  for  being  in  Judaea  and 
Jerusalem  a  month  before  it,  both  that  He  might  once  more  preach  in 
those  neighbourhoods,  and  that  He  might  avoid  the  publicity  and 
dangerous  excitement  involved  in  His  joining  the  caravan  of  the 
Passover  pilgrims  from  Galilee.  Such  an  opportunity  may  naturally 
have  arisen  from  the  absence  of  the  Apostles  on  their  missionary  tour. 
The  Synoptists  give  clear  indications  that  Jesus  had  friends  and  well- 
wishers  at  Jerusalem  and  in  its  vicinity.  He  must  therefore  have 
paid  visits  to  those  regions  which  they  do  not  record.  Perhaps  it  was 


172  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

among  those  friends  that  He  awaited  the  return  of  His  immediate 
followers.  We  know  the  deep  affection  which  He  entertained  for  the 
members  of  one  household  in  Bethany,  and  it  is  not  unnatural  to 
suppose  that  He  was  now  living  in  the  peaceful  seclusion  of  that  pious 
household  as  a  solitary  and  honoured  guest. 

But  even  if  St.  John  intends  us  to  believe  that  the  occurrence  of 
this  feast  was  the  immediate  cause  of  this  visit  to  Jerusalem,  we  must 
bear  in  mind  that  there  is  no  proof  whatever  of  its  having  been  in  our 
Lord's  time  the  fantastic  and  disorderly  commemoration  which  it  sub- 
sequently became.  The  nobler-minded  Jews  doubtless  observed  it  in  a 
calm  and  grateful  manner ;  and  as  one  part  of  the  festival  consisted  in 
showing  acts  of  kindness  to  the  poor,  it  may  have  offered  an  attraction 
to  Jcsuy,  both  on  this  ground  and  because  it  enabled  Him  to  show 
that  there  was  nothing  unnational  or  unpatriotic  in  the  universal 
character  of  His  message,  or  the  all-embracing  infinitude  of  the 
charity  which  He  both  practised  and  enjoined. 

There  remains  then  but  a  single  question.  The  Passover  was 
rapidly  drawing  near,  and  His  presence  at  that  great  feast  would  on 
every  ground  be  expected.  Why  then  did  He  absent  Himself  from  it  ? 
Why  did  He  return  to  Galilee  instead  of  remaining  at  Jerusalem? 
The  events  which  we  are  about  to  narrate  will  furnish  a  sufficient 
answer  to  this  question. 


CHAPTER   XXVII. 

THE    MIRACLE    OF    BETHESDA. 

THERE  was  in  Jerusalem,  near  the  Sheep-gate,  a  pool,  which  was 
believed  to  possess  remarkable  healing  properties.  For  this  reason, 
in  addition  to  its  usual  name,  it  had  been  called  in  Hebrew  "  Bethesda," 
or  the  House  of  Mercy,  and  under  the  porticoes  which  adorned  the 
pentagonal  masonry  in  which  it  was  enclosed  lay  a  multitude  of  suf- 
ferers from  blindness,  lameness,  and  atrophy,  waiting  to  take  advantage 
of  the  bubbling  and  gushing  of  the  water,  which  showed  that  its 
medicinal  properties  were  at  their  highest.  There  is  no  indication  in 
the  narrative  that  any  one  who  thus  used  the  water  was  at  once,  or 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  173 

miraculously,  healed;  but  the  repeated  use  of  an  intermittent  and 
gaseous  spring — and  more  than  one  of  the  springs  about  Jerusalem 
continue  to  be  of  this  character  to  the  present  day — was  doubtless 
likely  to  produce  most  beneficial  results. 

A  very  early  popular  legend,  which  has  crept  by  interpolation  into 
the  text  of  St.  John,  attributed  the  healing  qualities  of  the  water  to 
the  descent  of  an  angel  who  troubled  the  pool  at  irregular  intervals, 
leaving  the  first  persons  who  could  scramble  into  it  to  profit  by  the 
immersion.  This  solution  of  the  phenomenon  was  in  fact  so  entirely 
in  accordance  with  the  Semitic  habit  of  mind,  that,  in  the  universal 
ignorance  of  all  scientific  phenomena,  and  the  utter  indifference  to 
close  investigation  which  characterise  most  Orientals,  the  populace 
would  not  be  likely  to  trouble  themselves  about  the  possibility  of  any 
other  explanation.  But  whatever  may  have  been  the  general  belief 
about  the  cause,  the  fact  that  the  water  was  found  at  certain  intervals 
to  be  impregnated  with  gases  which  gave  it  a  strengthening  property, 
was  sufficient  to  attract  a  concourse  of  many  sufferers. 

Among  these  was  one  poor  man  who,  for  no  less  than  thirty-eight 
years,  had  been  lamed  by  paralysis.  He  had  haunted  the  porticoes  of 
this  pool,  but  without  effect ;  for  as  he  was  left  there  unaided,  and  as 
the  motion  of  the  water  occurred  at  irregular  times,  others  more  fortu- 
nate and  less  feeble  than  himself  managed  time  after  time  to  struggle 
in  before  him,  until  the  favourable  moment  had  been  lost. 

Jesus  looked  on  the  man  with  heartfelt  pity.  It  was  obvious  that 
the  will  of  the  poor  destitute  creature  was  no  less  stricken  with  para- 
lysis than  his  limbs,  and  his  whole  life  was  one  long  atrophy  of 
ineffectual  despair.  But  Jesus  was  minded  to  make  His  Purim  pre- 
sent to  the  poor,  to  whom  He  had  neither  silver  nor  gold  to  give.  He 
would  help  a  fellow-sufferer,  whom  no  one  had  cared  or  condescended 
to  help  before. 

"  Wiliest  thou  to  be  made  whole  ?  " 

At  first  the  words  hardly  stirred  the  man's  long  and  despondent 
lethargy  ;  he  scarcely  seems  even  to  have  looked  up.  But  thinking, 
perhaps,  with  a  momentary  gleam  of  hope,  that  this  was  some  stranger 
who,  out  of  kindness  of  heart,  might  help  him  into  the  water  when  it 
was  again  agitated,  he  merely  narrated  in  reply  the  misery  of  his  long 
and  futile  expectation.  Jesus  had  intended  a  speedier  and  more 
effectual  aid. 

"  Rise,"  He  said,  "  take  thy  couch,  and  walk." 

It  was  spoken  in  an  accent  that  none  could  disobey.     The  manner 


174  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

of  the  Speaker,  His  voice,  His  mandate,  thrilled  like  an  electric  spark- 
through  the  withered  limbs  and  the  shattered  constitution,  enfeebled 
by  a  lifetime  of  suffering  and  sin.  After  thirty-eight  years  of  pros- 
tration, the  man  instantly  rose,  lifted  up  his  pallet  and  began  to  walk. 
In  glad  amazement  he  looked  round  to  see  and  to  thank  his  unknown 
benefactor ;  but  the  crowd  was  large,  and  Jesus,  anxious  to  escape  the 
unspiritual  excitement  which  would  fain  have  regarded  Him.  as  a 
thaumaturge  alone,  had  quietly  slipped  away  from  observation. 

In  spite  of  this,  many  scrupulous  and  jealous  eyes  were  soon  upon 
him.  In  proportion  as  the  inner  power  and  meaning  of  a  religion  are 
dead,  in  that  proportion  very  often  is  an  exaggerated  import  attached 
to  its  outer  forms.  Formalism  and  indifference,  pedantic  scrupulosity 
and  absolute  disbelief,  are  correlative,  and  ever  flourish  side  by  side. 
It  was  so  with  Judaism  in  the  days  of  Christ.  Its  living  and  burning 
enthusiasm  was  quenched ;  its  lofty  and  noble  faith  had  died  away  ;  its 
prophets  had  ceased  to  prophesy ;  its  poets  had  ceased  to  sing ;  its 
priests  were  no  longer  clothed  with  righteousness;  its  saints  were 
few.  The  axe  was  at  the  root  of  the  barren  tree,  and  its  stem  served 
only  to  nourish  a  fungous  brood  of  ceremonials  and  traditions, 

"  Deathlike,  and  coloured  like  a  corpse's  cheek." 

And  thus  it  was  that  the  observance  of  the  Sabbath,  which  had  been 
intended  to  secure  for  weary  men  a  rest  full  of  love  and  peace  and 
mercy,  had  become  a  mere  national  Fetish — a  barren  custom  fenced 
in  with  the  most  frivolous  and  senseless  restrictions.  Well-nigh  every 
great  provision  of  the  Mosaic  law  had  now  been  degraded  into  a  mere 
superfluity  of  meaningless  minutiae,  the  delight  of  small  natures,  and 
the  grievous  incubus  of  all  true  and  natural  piety. 

Now,  when  a  religion  has  thus  decayed  into  a  superstition  without 
having  lost  its  external  power,  it  is  always  more  than  ever  tyrannous 
and  suspicious  in  its  hunting  for  heresy.  The  healed  paralytic  was 
soon  surrounded  by  a  group  of  questioners.  They  looked  at  him  with 
surprise  and  indignation. 

"  It  is  the  Sabbath ;  it  is  not  lawful  for  thee  to  carry  thy  bed." 

Here  was  a  flagrant  case  of  violation  of  their  law!  Had  not  the  son 
of  Shelomith,  .though  half  an  Egyptian,  been  stoned  to  death  for 
gathering  sticks  on  the  Sabbath  day  ?  Had  not  the  prophet  Jeremiah 
expressly  said,  "  Take  heed  to  yourselves,  and  bear  no  burdenAno  the 
Sabbath  day  ?  " 

Yes ;  but  why  ?     Because  the  Sabbath  was  an  ordinance  of  mercy 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHBIST.  175 

intended  to  protect  the  underlings  and  the  oppressed  from  a  life  of 
incessant  toil ;  because  it  was  essential  to  save  the  serfs  and  labourers 
of  the  nation  from  the  over-measure  of  labour  which  would  have  been 
exacted  from,  them  in  a  nation  afflicted  with  the  besetting  sin  of  greed  ; 
because  the  setting  apart  of  one  day  in  seven  for  sacred  rest  was  of 
infinite  value  to  the  spiritual  life  of  all.  That  was  the  meaning  of  the 
Fourth  Commandment.  In  what  respect  was  it  violated  by  the  fact 
that  a  man  who  had  been  healed  by  a  miracle  wished  to  carry  homo 
the  mere  pallet  which  was  perhaps  almost  the  only  thing  that  he 
possessed  ?  What  the  man  really  violated  was  not  the  law  of  God,  or 
even  of  Moses,  but  the  wretched  formalistic  inferences  of  their  frigid 
tradition,  which  had  gravely  decided  that  on  the  Sabbath  a  nailed  shoe 
might  not  be  worn  because  it  was  a  burden,  but  that  an  tin-nailed  shoo 
might  be  worn ;  and  that  a  person  might  go  out  with  two  shoes  on, 
but  not  with  only  one ;  and  that  one  man  might  carry  a  loaf  of  bread, 
but  that  two  men  might  not  carry  it  between  them,  and  so  forth,  to  the 
very  utmost  limit  of  tyrannous  absurdity. 

"  He  that  made  me  whole,"  replied  the  man,  "  He  said  to  me,  Take 
up  thy  bed  and  walk." 

As  far  as  the  man  was  concerned,  they  accepted  the  plea ;  a  voice 
fraught  with  miraculous  power  so  stupendous  that  it  could  heal  the 
impotence  of  a  lifetime  by  a  word,  was  clearly,  as  far  as  the  man  was 
concerned,  entitled  to  some  obedience.  And  the  fact  was  that  they 
were  actuated  by  a  motive ;  they  were  flying  at  higher  game  than 
this  insignificant  and  miserable  sufferer.  Nothing  was  to  bo  gained 
by  worrying  Mm. 

"  IVTio  is  it  that " — mark  the  malignity  of  these  Jewish  authorities 
— not  that  made  tliee  whole,  for  there  was  no  heresy  to  be  hunted  out 
in  the  mere  fact  of  exercising  miraculous  power — but  "  that  gave  thee 
the  wicked  command  to  take  up  thy  bed  and  walk  ?  " 

So  little  apparently,  up  to  this  time,  was  the  person  of  Jesus 
generally  known  in  the  suburbs  of  Jerusalem,  or  else  so  dull  and 
languid  had  been  the  man's  attention  while  Jesus  was  first  speaking 
to  him,  that  he  actually  did  not  know  who  his  benefactor  was.  But 
he  ascertained  shortly  afterwards.  It  is  a  touch  of  grace  about  him 
that  we  next  find  him  in  the  Temple,  whither  he  may  well  have  gone 
to  return  thanks  to  God  for  this  sudden  and  marvellous  renovation 
of  his  wasted  life.  There,  too,  Jesus  saw  him,  and  addressed  to  him 
one  simple  memorable  warning,  "  See,  thou  hast  been  made  whole : 
continue  in  sin  no  longer,  lest  something  worse  happen  to  thee." 


176  THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

Perhaps  the  warning  had  been  given  because  Christ  read  the  mean 
and  worthless  nature  of  the  man ;  at  any  rate,  there  is  something  at 
first  sight  peculiarly  revolting  in  the  15th  verse.  "  The  man  went  and 
told  the  Jeivish  authorities  that  it  was  Jesus  who  had  made  him  whole." 
It  is  barely  possible,  though  most  unlikely,  that  he  may  have  meant  to 
magnify  the  name  of  One  who  had  wrought  such  a  mighty  work  ;  but 
as  he  must  have  been  well  aware  of  the  angry  feelings  of  the  Jews — 
as  we  hear  no  word  of  his  gratitude  or  devotion,  no  word  of  amaze- 
ment or  glorifying  God — as,  too,  it  must  have  been  abundantly  clear 
to  him  that  Jesus  in  working  the  miracle  had  been  touched  by  com- 
passion only,  and  had  been  anxious  to  shun  all  publicity — it  must  be 
confessed  that  the  primd  facie  view  of  the  man's  conduct  is  that  it  was 
an  act  of  needless  and  contemptible  delation — a  piece  of  most  pitiful 
self -protection  at  the  expense  of  his  benefactor — an  almost  inconceivable 
compound  of  feeble  sycophancy  and  base  ingratitude.  Apparently  the 
warning  of  Jesus  had  been  most  deeply  necessary,  as,  if  we  judge  the 
man  aright,  it  was  wholly  unavailing. 

For  the  consequences  were  immediate  and  disastrous.  They 
changed  in  fact  the  entire  tenor  of  His  remaining  life.  Untouched  by 
the  evidence  of  a  most  tender  compassion,  unmoved  by  the  display  of 
miraculous  power,  the  Jewish  inquisitors  were  up  in  arms  to  defend 
their  favourite  piece  of  legalism.  "  They  began  to  persecute  Jesus  be- 
cause He  did  such  things  on  the  Sabbath  day." 

And  it  was  in  answer  to  this  charge  that  He  delivered  the  divine 
and  lofty  discourse  preserved  for  us  in  the  5th  chapter  of  St.  John. 
Whether  it  was  delivered  in  the  Temple,  or  before  some  committee  of 
the  Sanhedrin,  we  cannot  tell ;  but,  at  any  rate,  the  great  Rabbis  and 
Chief  Priests  who  summoned  Him  before  them,  that  they  might  rebuke 
and  punish  Him  for  a  breach  of  the  Sabbath,  were  amazed  and  awed; 
if  also  they  were  bitterly  and  implacably  infuriated,  by  the  words  they 
heard.  They  had  brought  Him  before  them  in  order  to  warn,  and  the 
warnings  fell  on  them.  They  had  wished  to  instruct  and  reprove,  and 
then,  perhaps,  condescendingly,  for  this  once,  to  pardon ;  and  lo  !  He 
mingles  for  them  the  majesty  of  instruction  with  the  severity  of  com- 
passionate rebuke.  They  sat  round  Him  in  all  the  pomposities  of  their 
office,  to  overawe  Him  as  an  inferior,  and,  lo  !  they  tremble,  and  gnash 
their  teeth,  though  they  dare  not  act,  while  with  words  like  a  flame 
of  fire  piercing  into  the  very  joints  and  marrow — with  words  more 
full  of  wisdom  and  majesty  than  those  which  came  among  the 
thunders  of  Sinai — He  assumes  the  awful  dignity  of  the  Son  of  God. 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  177 

And  so  the  attempt  to  impress  on  Him  their  petty  rules  and  literal 
pietisms — to  lecture  Him  on  the  heinousness  of  working  miraculous 
cures  on  the  Sabbath  day — perhaps  to  punish  Him  for  the  enormity  of 
bidding  a  healed  man  take  up  his  bed — was  a  total  failure.  With  His 
very  first  word  He  exposes  their  materialism  and  ignorance.  They,  in 
their  feebleness,  had  thought  of  the  Sabbath  as  though  God  ceased  from 
working  thereon  because  He  was  fatigued ;  He  tells  them  that  that 
holy  rest  was  a  beneficent  activity.  They  thought  apparently,  as  men 
think  now,  that  God  had  resigned  to  certain  mute  forces  His  creative 
energy ;  He  tells  them  that  His  Father  is  working  still ;  and  He, 
knowing  His  father  and  loved  of  Him,  was  working  with  Him,  and 
should  do  greater  works  than  these  which  He  had  now  done.  Already 
was  He  quickening  the  spiritually  dead,  and  the  day  should  come 
when  all  in  the  tombs  should  hear  His  voice.  Already  He  was 
bestowing  eternal  life  on  all  that  believed  in  Him ;  hereafter  should 
His  voice  be  heard  in  that  final  judgment  of  the  quick  and  dead  which 
the  Father  had  committed  into  His  hands. 

Was  He  merely  bearing  witness  of  Himself?  Nay,  there  were 
three  mighty  witnesses  which  had  testified,  and  were  testifying,  of 
Him — John,  whom,  after  a  brief  admiration,  they  had  rejected ; 
Moses,  whom  they  boasted  of  following,  and  did  not  understand; 
God  Himself,  whom  they  professed  to  worship,  but  had  never  seen 
or  known.  They  themselves  had  sent  to  John  and  heard  his  testi- 
mony; but  He  needed  not  the  testimony  of  man,  and  mentioned  it 
only  for  their  sakes,  because  even  they  for  a  time  had  been  willing  to 
exult  in  that  great  Prophet's  God-enkindled  light.  But  He  had  far 
loftier  witness  than  that  of  John — the  witness  of  a  miraculous  power, 
exerted  not  as  prophets  had  exerted  it,  in  the  name  of  God,  but  in  His 
own  name,  because  His  Father  had  given  such  power  into  His  hand. 
That  Father  they  knew  not :  His  light  they  had  abandoned  for  the 
darkness ;  His  word  for  their  own  falsehoods  and  ignorances ;  and 
they  had  rejected  Him  whom  He  had  sent.  But  there  was  a  third 
testimony.  If  they  knew  nothing  of  the  Father,  they  at  least  knew, 
or  thought  they  knew,  the  Scriptures ;  the  Scriptures  were  in  their 
hands ;  they  had  counted  the  very  letters  of  them ;  yet  they  were 
rejecting  Him  of  whom  the  Scriptures  testified.  Was  it  not  clear  that 
they — the  righteous,  the  pious,  the  scrupulous,  the  separatists,  the 
priests,  the  religious  leaders  of  their  nation — yet  had  not  the  love  of 
God  in  them,  if  they  thus  rejected  His  prophet,  His  word,  His  works, 
His  Son  ? 


]78  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

And  what  was  the  fibre  of  bitterness  within  them  which  produced 
all  this  bitter  fruit  ?  Was  it  not  pride  ?  How  could  they  believe, 
who  sought  honour  of  one  another,  and  not  the  honour  that  cometh 
of  God  only  ?  Hence  it  was  that  they  rejected  One  who  came  in  His 
Father's  name,  while  they  had  been,  and  should  be,  the  ready  dupes 
and  the  miserable  victims  of  every  false  Messiah,  of  every  Judas,  and 
Theudas,  and  Bar-Cochebas — and,  in  Jewish  history,  thero  were  more 
than  sixty  such — who  came  in  his  own  name. 

And  yet  He  would  not  accuse  them  to  the  Father;  they  had 
another  accuser,  even  Moses,  in  whom  they  trusted.  Yes,  Moses,  in 
whose  lightest  word  they  professed  to  trust — over  the  most  trivial 
precept  of  whose  law  they  had  piled  their  mountain  loads  of  tradition 
and  commentary — even  Mm  they  were  disbelieving  and  disobeying. 
Had  they  believed  Moses,  they  would  have  believed  Him  who  spoke  to 
them,  for  Moses  wrote  of  Him ;  but  if  they  thus  rejected  the  true 
meaning  of  the  written  words  (ypa/jLfjLacriv}  which  they  professed  to 
adore  and  love,  how  could  they  believe  the  spoken  words  (pifaacriv) 
to  which  they  were  listening  with  rage  and  hate  ? 

We  know  with  what  deadly  exasperation  these  high  utterances 
were  received.  Never  before  had  the  Christ  spoken  so  plainly.  It 
seemed  as  though  in  Galilee  He  had  wished  the  truth  respecting  Him 
to  rise  like  a  gradual  and  glorious  dawn  upon  the  souls  and  under- 
standings of  those  who  heard  His  teaching  and  watched  His  works ; 
but  as  though  at  Jerusalem — where  His  ministry  was  briefer,  and  His 
followers  fewer,  and  His  opponents  stronger,  and  His  mighty  works 
more  rare — He  had  determined  to  leave  the  leaders  and  rulers  of  the 
people  without  excuse,  by  revealing  at  once  to  their  astonished  ears 
the  nature  of  His  being.  More  distinctly  than  this  He  could  not 
have  spoken.  They  had  summoned  Him  before  them  to  explain  His 
breach  of  the  Sabbath ;  so  far  from  excusing  the  act  itself,  as  He 
sometimes  did  in  Galilee,  by  showing  that  the  higher  and  moral  law 
of  love  supersedes  and  annihilates  the  lower  law  of  mere  literal  and 
ceremonial  obedience— instead  of  showing  that  He  had  but  acted  in 
the  spirit  in  which  the  greatest  of  saints  had  acted  before  Him,  and 
the  greatest  of  prophets  taught — He  sets  Himself  wholly  above  the 
Sabbath,  as  its  Lord,  nay,  even  as  the  Son  and  Interpreter  of  Him 
•who  had  made  the  Sabbath,  and  who  in  all  the  mighty  course  of 
Nature  and  of  Providence  was  continuing  to  work  thereon. 

Here,  then,  were  two  deadly  charges  ready  at  hand  against  thif 
Prophet  of  Nazareth :  He  was  a  breaker  of  their  Sabbath ;  He  was  a 


TEE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  179 

blasphemer  of  their  God.  The  first  crime  was  sufficient  cause  for 
opposition  and  persecution;  the  second  an  ample  justification  of  per- 
sistent and  active  endeavours  to  bring  about  His  death. 

But  at  present  they  could  do  nothing ;  they  could  only  rage  in 
impotent  indignation;  they  could  only  gnash  with  their  teeth  and 
melt  away.  Whatever  may  have  been  the  cause,  as  yet  they  dared 
not  act.  A  power  greater  than  their  own  restrained  them.  The  hour 
of  their  triumph  was  not  yet  come ;  only,  from  this  moment,  there 
went  forth  against  Him  from  the  hearts  of  those  Priests  and  Rabbis 
and  Pharisees  the  inexorable  irrevocable  sentence  of  violent  death. 

And  under  such  circumstances  it  was  useless,  and  worse  than 
nseless,  for  Hun  to  remain  in  Juda?a,  where  every  day  was  a  day  of 
peril  from  these  angry  and  powerful  conspirators.  He  could  no  longer 
remain  in  Jerusalem  for  the  approaching  Passover,  but  must  return  to 
Galilee ;  but  He  returned  with  a  clear  vision  of  the  fatal  end,  with  full 
knowledge  that  the  hours  of  light  in  which  He  could  still  work  were 
already  fading  into  the  dusk,  and  that  the  rest  of  His  work  would  bo 
accomplished  with  the  secret  sense  that  death  was  hanging  over  His 
devoted  head. 


CHAPTER 

THE   MURDER  OF  JOHN  THE   BAPTIST. 

IT  must  have  been  with  His  human  heart  full  of  foreboding  sadness 
that  the  Saviour  returned  to  Galilee.  In  His  own  obscure  Nazareth 
He  had  before  been  violently  rejected ;  He  had  now  been  rejected  no 
less  decisively  at  Jerusalem  by  the  leading  authorities  of  His  own 
nation.  He  was  returning  to  an  atmosphere  already  darkened  by  the 
storm-clouds  of  gathering  opposition ;  and  He  had  scarcely  returned 
when  upon  that  atmosphere,  like  the  first  note  of  a  death-knell  tolling 
ruin,  there  broke  the  intelligence  of  a  dreadful  martyrdom.  The 
heaven-enkindled  and  shining  lamp  had  suddenly  been  quenched  in 
blood.  The  great  Forerunner — He  who  was  greatest  of  those  born  of 
women — the  Prophet,  and  more  than  a  prophet,  had  been  foully 
murdered. 

N  2 


180  THE   LIFE    OP   CHRIST. 

Herod  Antipas,  to  whom,  on  the  death  of  Herod  the  Great,  had 
fallen  the  tetrarchy  of  Galilee,  was  about  as  weak  and  miserable  a 
prince  as  ever  disgraced  the  throne  of  an  afflicted  country.  Cruel, 
crafty,  and  voluptuous  like  his  father,  he  was  also,  unlike  him,  weak 
in  war  and  vacillating  in  peace.  In  him,  as  in  so  many  characters 
which  stand  conspicuous  on  the  stage  of  history,  infidelity  and  super- 
stition went  hand  in  hand.  But  the  morbid  terrors  of  a  guilty  con- 
science did  not  save  him  from  the  criminal  extravagances  of  a  violent 
will.  He  was  a  man  in  whom  were  mingled  the  worst  features  of  the 
Roman,  the  Oriental,  and  the  Greek. 

It  was  the  policy  of  the  numerous  princelings  who  owed  their  very 
existence  to  Roman  intervention,  to  pay  frequent  visits  of  ceremony  to 
the  Emperor  at  Rome.  During  one  of  these  visits,  possibly  to  condole 
with  Tiberius  on  the  death  of  his  son  Drusus,  or  his  mother  Livia, 
Antipas  had  been,  while  at  Rome,  the  guest  of  his  brother  Herod 
Philip — not  the  tetrarch  of  that  name,  but  a  son  of  Herod  the  Great 
and  Mariamne,  daughter  of  Simon  the  Boethusian,  who,  having  been 
disinherited  by  his  father,  was  living  at  Rome  as  a  private  person. 
Here  he  became  entangled  by  the  snares  of  Herodias,  his  brother 
Philip's  wife  ;  and  he  repaid  the  hospitality  he  had  received  by  carrying 
her  off.  Everything  combined  to  make  the  act  as  detestable  as  it  was 
ungrateful  and  treacherous.  The  Herods  carried  intermarriage  to  an 
extent  which  only  prevailed  in  the  worst  and  most  dissolute  of  the 
Oriental  and  post-Macedonian  dynasties.  Herodias  being  the  daughter 
of  Aristobulus,  was  not  only  the  sister-in-law,  but  also  the  niece  of 
Antipas  ;  she  had  already  borne  to  her  husband  a  daughter,  who  was 
now  grown  up.  Antipas  had  himself  long  been  married  to  the  daughter 
of  Aretas,  or  Hareth,  Emir  of  Arabia,  and  neither  he  nor  Herodias 
were  young  enough  to  plead  even  the  poor  excuse  of  youthful  passion. 
The  sole  temptation  on  his  side  was  an  impotent  sensuality ;  on  hers 
an  extravagant  ambition.  She  preferred  a  marriage  doubly  adulterous 
and  doubly  incestuous  to  a  life  spent  with  the  only  Herod  who  could 
not  boast  even  the  fraction  of  a  vice-regal  throne.  Antipas  promised 
on  his  return  from  Rome  to  make  her  his  wife,  and  she  exacted  from 
him  a  pledge  that  he  would  divorce  his  innocent  consort,  the  daughter 
of  the  Arabian  prince. 

But  "our  pleasant  vices,"  it  has  well  been  said,  "are  made  the 
instruments  to  punish  us ; "  and  from  this  moment  began  for  Herod 
Antipas  a  series  of  annoyances  and  misfortunes,  which  only  culminated 
in  his  death  years  afterwards  in  discrowned  royalty  and  unpitiod  exile. 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  181 

Herodias  became  from  the  first  the  evil  genius  of  his  house.  The 
people  were  scandalised  and  outraged.  Family  dissensions  were  em- 
bittered. The  Arabian  princess,  without  waiting  to  be  divorced,  indig- 
nantly fled,  first  to  the  border  castle  of  Machserus,  and  then  to  the 
rocky  fastnesses  of  her  father  Hareth  at  Petra.  He,  in  his  just  indig. 
nation,  broke  off  all  amicable  relations  with  his  quondam  son-in-law, 
and  subsequently  declared  war  against  him,  in  which  he  avenged  him- 
self by  the  infliction  of  a  severe  and  ruinous  defeat. 

Nor  was  this  all.  Sin  was  punished  with  sin,  and  the  adulterous 
union  had  to  be  cemented  with  a  prophet's  blood.  In  the  gay  and 
gilded  halls  of  any  one  of  those  sumptuous  palaces  which  the  He  rods 
delighted  to  build,  the  dissolute  tyrant  may  have  succeeded  perhaps  in 
shutting  out  the  deep  murmur  of  his  subjects'  indignation  ;  but  there 
was  one  voice  which  reached  him,  and  agitated  his  conscience,  and 
would  not  be  silenced.  It  was  the  voice  of  the  great  Baptist.  How 
Herod  had  been  thrown  first  into  connection  with  him  we  do  not  know, 
but  it  was  probably  after  he  had  seized  possession  of  his  person  on  the 
political  plea  that  his  teaching,  and  the  crowds  who  flocked  to  him, 
tended  to  endanger  the  public  safety.  Among  other  features  in  the 
character  of  Herod  was  a  certain  superstitious  curiosity  which  led 
him  to  hanker  after  and  tamper  with  the  truths  of  the  religion  which 
his  daily  life  so  flagrantly  violated.  He  summoned  John  to  his  presence. 
Like  a  new  Elijah  before  another  Ahab — clothed  in  his  desert  raiment, 
the  hairy  cloak  and  the  leathern  girdle — the  stern  and  noble  eremite 
stood  fearless  before  the  incestuous  king.  His  words — the  simple 
words  of  truth  and  justice — the  calm  reasonings  about  righteousness, 
temperance,  and  the  judgment  to  come — fell  like  flakes  of  fire  on  that 
hard  and  icy  conscience.  Herod,  alarmed  perhaps  by  the  fulfilment  of 
the  old  curse  of  the  Mosaic  law  in  the  childlessness  of  his  union, 
listened  with  some  dim  and  feeble  hope  of  future  amendment.  He 
even  did  many  things  gladly  because  of  John.  But  there  was  one 
thing  which  he  would  not  do — perhaps  persuaded  himself  that  he 
could  not  do — and  that  was,  give  up  the  guilty  love  which  mastered 
him,  or  dismiss  the  haughty  imperious  woman  who  ruled  his  life  after 
ruining  his  peace.  "  It  is  not  lawful  for  thee  to  have  thy  brother's 
wife"  was  the  blunt  declaration  of  the  dauntless  Prophet;  and 
though  time  after  time  he  might  be  led  over  those  splendid  floors, 
pale  and  wasted  with  imprisonment  and  disappointed  hope,  yet, 
though  he  well  knew  that  it  kindled  against  him  an  implacable 
enmity  and  doomed  him  to  a  fresh  remand  to  his  solitary  cell,  he 


182  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  ' 

never  hesitated  to  face  the  flushed  and  angry  Herod  with  that  great 
Non  licet.  Nor  did  he  spare  his  stern  judgment  on  all  the  other 
crimes  and  follies  of  Herod's  life.  Other  men — even  men  otherwise 
great  and  good — have  had  very  smooth  words  for  the  sins  of  princes  ; 
but  in  the  fiery  soul  of  the  Baptist,  strengthened  into  noblest  exercise 
by  the  long  asceticism  of  the  wilderness,  there  was  no  dread  of  human 
royalty  and  no  compromise  with  exalted  sin.  And  when  courage  and 
holiness  and  purity  thus  stood  to  rebuke  the  lustful  meanness  of  a 
servile  and  corrupted  soul,  can  we  wonder  if  even  among  his  glittering 
courtiers  and  reckless  men-at-arrns  the  king  cowered  conscience- 
stricken  before  the  fettered  prisoner  ?  But  John  knew  how  little 
trust  can  be  placed  in  a  soul  that  has  been  eaten  away  by  a  besetting 
sin ;  and  since  He  to  whom  he  had  borne  witness  beyond  Jordan 
wrought  no  miracle  of  power  for  his  deliverance,  it  is  not  probable 
that  he  looked  for  any  passage  out  of  his  dungeon  in  the  Black 
Fortress,  save  through  the  grave  and  gate  of  death. 

Hitherto,  indeed,  the  timidity  or  the  scruples  of  Herod  Antipas 
had  afforded  to  John — so  far  as  his  mere  life  was  concerned — a 
precarious  protection  from  the  concentrated  venom  of  an  adulteress's 
hate.  But  at  last  what  she  had  failed  to  gain  by  passionate  influence 
she  succeeded  in  gaining  by  subtle  fraud.  She  knew  well  that  even 
from  his  prison  the  voice  of  John  might  be  more  powerful  than  all  the 
influences  of  her  fading  beauty,  and  might  succeed  at  last  in  tearing 
from  her  forehead  that  guilty  crown.  But  she  watched  her  oppor- 
tunity, and  was  not  long  in  gaining  her  end. 

The  Herodian  princess,  imitating  the  luxurious  example  of  their 
great  prototypes,  the  Roman  emperors,  were  fond  of  magnificent 
banquets  and  splendid  anniversaries.  Among  others  they  had  adopted 
the  heathen  fashion  of  birthday  celebrations,  and  Antipas  on  his  birth- 
day— apparently  cither  at  Machcerus  or  at  a  neighbouring  palace 
called  Julias — prepared  a  banquet  for  his  courtiers,  and  generals,  and 
Galilceau  nobles.  The  wealth  of  the  Herods,  the  expensive  architecture 
of  their  numerous  palaces,  their  universal  tendency  to  extravagant 
display,  make  it  certain  that  nothing  would  be  wanting  to  such  a 
banquet  which  wealth  or  royalty  could  procure  ;  and  there  is  enough 
to  show  that  it  was  on  the  model  of  those 

"  Sumptuous  gluttonies  and  gorgeous  feasts 
On  citron  table  or  Atlantic  stone," 

•which  accorded  with  the  depraved  fashion  of  the  Empire,  and  mingled 


'THE    LIFE   OF   CH1UST.  183 

Roman  gmtrmandise  with  Ionic  sensuality.  But  Herodias  had  craftily 
provided  the  king  with  an  unexpected  and  exciting  pleasure,  the 
spectacle  of  which  would  be  sure  to  enrapture  such  guests  as  his. 
Dancers  and  dancing- women  were  at  that  time  in  great  request.  The 
passion  for  witnessing  these  too  often  indecent  and  degrading  repre- 
sentations had  naturally  made  its  way  into  the  Sadducean  and  semi- 
pagan  court  of  these  usurping  Edomites,  and  Herod  the  Great  had 
built  in  his  palace  a  theatre  for  the  Thymelici.  A  luxurious  feast  of  the 
period  was  not  regarded  as  complete  unless  it  closed  with  some  gross 
pantomimic  representation  ;  and  doubtless  Herod  had  adopted  the  evil 
fashion  of  his  day.  But  he  had  not  anticipated  for  his  guests  the  rare 
luxury  of  seeing  a  princess — his  own  niece,  a  granddaughter  of  Herod 
the  Great  and  of  Mariamne,  a  descendant  therefore  of  Simon  the  High 
Priest,  and  the  great  line  of  Maccabaean  princes — a  princess  who  after- 
wards became  the  wife  of  a  tetrarch,  and  the  mother  of  a  king — 
honouring  them  by  degrading  herself  into  a  scenic  dancer.  And  yet 
when  the  banquet  was  over,  when  the  guests  were  full  of  meat  and 
flushed  with  wine,  Salome  herself,  the  daughter  of  Herodias,  then  in 
the  prime  of  her  young  and  lustrous  beauty,  executed,  as  it  would  now 
be  expressed,  a  pas  seul  "  in  the  midst  of  "  those  dissolute  and  half- 
intoxicated  revellers.  "  She  came  in  and  danced,  and  pleased  Herod, 
and  them  that  sat  at  meat  with  him."  And  he,  like  another  Xerxes, 
in  the  delirium  of  his  drunken  approval,  swore  to  this  degraded  girl  in 
the  presence  of  his  guests  that  he  would  give  her  anything  for  which 
she  asked,  even  to  the  half  of  his  kingdom. 

The  girl  flew  to  her  mother,  and  said,  "  What  shall  I  ask  ?  "  It 
was  exactly  what  Herodias  expected,  and  she  might  have  asked  for 
robes,  or  jewels,  or  palaces,  or  whatever  such  a  woman  loves ;  but  to  a 
mind  like  hers  revenge  was  sweeter  than  wealth  or  pride,  and  we  may 
imagine  with  what  fierce  malice  she  hissed  out  the  unhesitating 
answer,  "  The  head  of  John  the  Baptiser."  And  coming  in  before 
the  king  immediately  with  haste — (what  a  touch  is  that!  and  how 
apt  a  pupil  did  the  wicked  mother  find  in  her  wicked  daughter) — 
Salome  exclaimed,  "  My  wish  is  that  you  give  me  here,  immediately,  on 
a  dish,  the  head  of  John  the  Baptist."  Her  indecent  haste,  her  hideous 
petition,  show  that  she  shared  the  furies  of  her  race.  Did  she  think 
that  in  that  infamous  period,  and  among  those  infamous  guests,  her 
petition  would  be  received  with  a  burst  of  laughter  ?  Did  she  hope  to 
kindle  their  merriment  to  a  still  higher  pitch  by  the  sense  of  the 
delightful  wickedness  involved  in  a  young  and  beautiful  girl,  asking 


184  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

— nay,  imperiously  demanding — that  then  and  there,  on  one  of  the 
golden  dishes  which  graced  the  board,  should  be  given  into  her  own 
hands  the  gory  head  of  the  Prophet  whose  words  had  made  a  thousand 
bold  hearts  quail  ? 

If  so,  she  was  disappointed.  The  tetrarch,  at  any  rate,  was  plunged 
into  grief  by  her  request ;  it  more  than  did  away  with  the  pleasure  of 
her  disgraceful  dance :  it  was  a  bitter  termination  of  his  birthday 
feast.  Fear,  policy,  remorse,  superstition,  even  whatever  poor  spark 
of  better  feeling  remained  unquenched  under  the  dense  white  ashes 
of  a  heart  consumed  by  evil  passions,  all  made  him.  shrink  in  disgust 
from  this  sudden  execution.  He  must  have  felt  that  he  had  been 
cgregiously  duped  out  of  his  own  will  by  the  cunning  stratagem  of 
his  unrelenting  paramour.  If  a  single  touch  of  manliness  had  been 
left  in  him  he  would  have  repudiated  the  request  as  one  which  did  not 
fall  either  under  the  letter  or  the  spirit  of  his  oath,  since  the  life  of 
one  cannot  be  made  the  gift  to  another;  or  he  would  have  boldly 
declared  at  once,  that  if  such  was  her  choice,  his  oath  was  more 
honoured  by  being  broken  than  by  being  kept.  But  a  despicable 
pride  and  fear  of  man  prevailed  over  his  better  impulses.  More  afraid 
of  the  criticisms  of  his  guests  than  of  the  future  torment  of  such 
conscience  as  was  left  him,  he  immediately  sent  an  executioner  to  the 
prison,  which  in  all  probability  was  not  far  from  the  banqueting  hall ; 
and  so,  at  the  bidding  of  a  dissolute  coward,  and  to  please  the  loathly 
fancies  of  a  shameless  girl,  the  axe  fell,  and  the  head  of  the  noblest 
of  the  prophets  was  shorn  away. 

In  darkness  and  in  secrecy  the  scene  was  enacted,  and  if  any  saw 
it  their  lips  were  sealed ;  but  the  executioner  emerged  into  the  light 
carrying  by  the  hair  that  noble  head,  and  then  and  there,  in  all  the 
ghastliness  of  recent  death,  it  was  placed  upon  a  dish  from  the  royal 
table.  The  young  dancing  girl  received  it,  and,  now  frightful  as  a 
Megoera,  carried  the  hideous  burden  to  her  mother.  Let  us  hope  that 
the  awful  spectacle  haunted  the  souls  of  both  thenceforth  till  death. 

What  became  of  that  ghastly  relic  we  do  not  know.  Tradition 
tells  us  that  Herodias  ordered  the  headless  trunk  to  be  flung  out  over 
the  battlements  for  dogs  and  vultures  to  devour.  On  her,  at  any  rate, 
swift  vengeance  fell. 

The  disciples  of  John — perhaps  Manaen  the  Essene,  the  foster- 
brother  of  Herod  Antipas,  may  have  been  among  them — took  up  the 
corpse  and  buried  it.  Their  next  care  was  to  go  and  tell  Jesus,  some 
of  them,  it  may  be,  with  sore  and  bitter  hearts,  that  his  friend  and 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  185 

forerunner — the  first  who  had  borne  witness  to  Him,  and  over  whom 
He  had  Himself  pronounced  so  great  an  eulogy — was  dead. 

And  about  the  same  time  His  Apostles  also  returned  from  their 
mission,  and  told  Him  all  that  they  had  done  and  taught.  They  had 
preached  repentance  :  they  had  cast  out  devils  ;  they  had  anointed  the 
sick  with  oil  and  healed  them.  But  the  record  of  their  ministry  is 
very  brief,  and  not  very  joyous.  In  spite  of  partial  successes,  it  seemed 
as  if  their  untried  faith  had  as  yet  proved  inadequate  for  the  high  task 
imposed  on  them. 

And  very  shortly  afterwards  another  piece  of  intelligence  reached 
Jesus  ;  it  was  that  the  murderous  tetrarch  was  inquiring  about  Him  ; 
wished  to  see  Him ;  perhaps  would  send  and  demand  his  presence 
when  he  returned  to  his  new  palace,  the  Golden  House  of  his  new 
capital  at  Tiberias.  For  the  mission  of  the  Twelve  had  tended  more 
than  ever  to  spread  a  rumour  of  Him  among  the  people,  and  specu- 
lation respecting  Him  was  rife.  All  admitted  that  He  had  some  high 
claim  to  attention.  Some  thought  that  He  was  Elijah,  some  Jeremiah, 
others  one  of  the  Prophets ;  but  Herod  had  the  most  singular  solution 
of  the  problem.  It  is  said  that  when  Theodoric  had  ordered  the 
murder  of  Symmachus,  he  was  haunted  and  finally  maddened  by  tho 
phantom  of  the  old  man's  distorted  features  glaring  at  him  from  a  dish 
on  the  table ;  nor  can  it  have  been  otherwise  with  Herod  Antipas 
Into  his  banquet  hall  had  been  brought  the  head  of  one  whom,  in  the 
depth  of  his  inmost  being,  he  felt  to  have  been  holy  and  just ;  and  ho 
had  seen,  with  the  solemn  agony  of  death  still  resting  on  them,  the 
stern  features  on  which  he  had  often  gazed  with  awe.  Did  no  reproach 
issue  from  those  dead  lips  yet  louder  and  more  terrible  than  they  had 
spoken  in  life  ?  were  the  accents  which  had  uttered,  "  It  is  not  lawful 
for  thee  to  have  her,"  frozen  into  silence,  or  did  they  seem  to  issue 
with  supernatural  energy  from  the  mute  ghastliness  of  death  ?  If  wo 
mistake  not,  that  dissevered  head  was  rarely  thenceforth  absent  from 
Herod's  haunted  imagination  from  that  day  forward  till  he  lay  upon 
his  dying  bed.  And  now,  when  but  a  brief  time  afterwards,  he  heard 
of  the  fame  of  another  Prophet — of  a  Prophet  transcendently  mightier, 
and  one  who  wrought  miracles,  which  John  had  never  done — his  guilty 
conscience  shivered  with  superstitious  dread,  and  to  his  intimates  ho 
began  to  whisper  with  horror,  "  Tliis  is  John  the  Baptist  whom  I  be- 
headed :  he  is  risen  from  the  dead,  and  therefore  these  mighty  works 
are  wrought  by  him."  Had  John  sprung  to  life  again  thus  suddenly 
to  inflict  a  signal  vengeance  ?  would  he  come  to  the  strong  towers  of 


186  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

Macheerus  at  the  head  of  a  multitude  in  wild  revolt  ?  or  glide  through 
the  gilded  halls  of  Julias  or  Tiberias,  terrible,  at  midnight,  -with 
ghostly  tread  ?  "  Hast  thou  found  me,  0  mine  enemy?  " 

As  the  imperious  and  violent  temper  of  Herodias  was  the  constant 
scourge  of  her  husband's  peace,  so  her  mad  ambition  was  subsequently 
the  direct  cause  of  his  ruin.  When  the  Emperor  Caius  (Caligula) 
began  to  heap  favours  on  Herod  Agrippa  L,  Herodias,  sick  with  envy 
and  discontent,  urged  Antipas  to  sail  with  her  to  Borne  and  procure  a 
share  of  the  distinction  which  had  thus  been  given  to  her  brother. 
Above  all,  she  was  anxious  that  her  husband  should  obtain  the  title  of 
king,  instead  of  continuing  content  with  the  humbler  one  of  tetrarch. 
In  vain  did  the  timid  and  ease-loving  Antipas  point  out  to  her  the 
danger  to  which  he  might  be  exposed  by  such  a  request.  She  made 
his  life  so  bitter  to  him  by  her  importunity  that,  against  his  better 
judgment,  he  was  forced  to  yield.  The  event  justified  his  worst 
misgivings.  No  love  reigned  between  the  numerous  uncles  and 
nephews  and  half-brothers  in  the  tangled  family  of  Herod,  and  either 
out  of  policy  or  jealousy  Agrippa  not  only  discountenanced  the 
schemes  of  his  sister  and  uncle — though  they  had  helped  him  in  his 
own  misfortunes — but  actually  sent  his  freedman  Fortnnatus  to  Rome 
to  accuse  Antipas  of  treasonable  designs.  The  tetrarch  failed  to  clear 
himself  of  the  charge,  and  in  A.D.  39  was  banished  to  Lugdunum — 
probably  St.  Bertrand  de  Comminges,  in  Gaul,  not  far  from  the 
Spanish  frontier.  Herodias,  either  from  choice  or  necessity  or 
despair,  accompanied  his  exile,  and  here  they  both  died  in  obscurity 
and  dishonour.  Salome,  the  dancer — the  Lucrezia  Borgia  of  the 
Herodian  house — disappears  henceforth  from  history.  Tradition  or 
legend  alone  informs  us  that  she  met  with  an  early,  violent,  and 
hideous  death. 


CHAPTER    XXIX. 

THE   FEEDING   OF  THE   FIVE   THOUSAND,   AND   WALKING  ON  THE   SEA. 

THE  Feeding  of  the  Five  Thousand  is  one  of  the  few  miracles  during 
the  ministry  of  Christ  which  are  narrated  to  us  by  all  four  of  the 
Evangelists ;  and  as  it  is  placed  by  St.  John  after  the  nameless  festival 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  187 

and  just  before  a  Passover,  and  by  the  Synoptists  in  immediate 
connection  with  the  return  of  the  Twelve  and  the  execution  of 
the  Baptist,  we  can  hardly  err  in  introducing  it  at  this  point  of  our 
narrative. 

The  novel  jonrneyings  of  the  Apostles,  the  agitation  of  His  own 
recent  conflicts,  the  burden  of  that  dread  intelligence  which  had  just 
reached  Him,  the  constant  pressure  of  a  fluctuating  multitude  which 
absorbed  all  their  time,  once  more  rendered  it  necessary  that  the  little 
company  should  recover  the  tone  and  bloom  of  their  spirits  by  a  brief 
period  of  rest  and  solitude.  "Come  ye  yourselves,"  He  said,  "apart 
into  a  desert  place,  and  rest  a  while." 

At  the  north-eastern  corner  of  the  Lake,  a  little  beyond  the  point 
where  the  Jordan  enters  it,  was  a  second  Bethsaida,  or  "  Fish-house," 
once,  like  its  western  namesake,  a  small  village,  but  recently  enlarged 
and  beautified  by  Philip,  tetrarch  of  Ituraea,  and  called,  for  the  sake 
of  distinction,  Bethsaida  Julias.  The  second  name  had  been  given  it 
in  honour  of  Julia,  the  beautiful  but  infamous  daughter  of  the 
Emperor  Augustus.  These  half-heathen  Herodian  cities,  with  their 
imitative  Greek  architecture  and  adulatory  Roman  names,  seem  to 
have  repelled  rather  than  attracted  the  feet  of  Christ ;  and  though 
much  of  His  work  was  accomplished  in  the  neighbourhood  of  con- 
siderable cities,  we  know  of  no  city  except  Jerusalem  in  which  He 
ever  taught.  But  to  the  south  of  Bethsaida  Julias  was  the  green  and 
narrow  plain  of  El  Batihab,  which,  like  the  hills  that  close  it  round,, 
was  uninhabited  then  as  now.  Hitherward  the  little  vessel  steered 
its  course,  with  its  freight  of  weary  and  saddened  hearts  which  sought 
repose.  But  private  as  the  departure  had  been,  it  had  not  passed 
unobserved,  and  did  not  remain  unknown.  It  is  but  six  miles  by  sea 
from  Capernaum  to  the  retired  and  desolate  shore  which  was  their 
destination.  The  little  vessel,  evidently  retarded  by  unfavourable 
winds,  made  its  way  slowly  at  no  great  distance  from  the  shore,  and 
by  the  tune  it  reached  its  destination,  the  object  which  their  Master's 
kindness  had  desired  for  His  Apostles  was  completely  frustrated. 
Some  of  the  multitude  had  already  outrun  the  vessel,  and  were 
thronging  about  the  landing-place  when  the  prow  touched  the  pebbly 
shore ;  while  in  the  distance  were  seen  the  thronging  groups  of 
Passover  pilgrims,  who  were  attracted  out  of  their  course  by  the 
increasing  celebrity  of  this  Unknown  Prophet.  Jesus  was  touched 
with  compassion  for  them,  because  they  were  as  sheep  not  having  a 
shepherd.  We  may  conjecture  from  St.  John  that  on  reaching  the 


188  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

laud  He  and  His  disciples  climbed  the  hill-side,  and  there  waited  a 
short  time  till  the  whole  multitude  had  assembled.  Then  descending 
among  them  He  taught  them  many  things,  preaching  to  them  of  the 
kingdom  of  heaven,  and  healing  their  sick. 

The  day  wore  on ;  already  the  sun  was  sinking  towards  the 
western  hills,  yet  still  the  multitude  lingered,  charmed  by  that 
healing  voice  and  by  those  holy  words.  The  evening  would  soon 
come,  and  after  the  brief  Oriental  twilight,  the  wandering  crowd, 
who  in  their  excitement  had  neglected  even  the  necessities  of  life, 
would  find  themselves  in  the  darkness,  hungry  and  afar  from  every 
human  habitation.  The  disciples  began  to  be  anxious  lest  the  day 
should  end  in  some  unhappy  catastrophe,  which  would  give  a  fresh 
handle  to  the  already  embittered  enemies  of  their  Lord.  But  His  com- 
passion had  already  forestalled  their  considerate  anxiety,  and  had  sug- 
gested the  difficulty  to  the  mind  of  Philip.  A  little  consultation  took 
place.  To  buy  even  a  mouthful  apiece  for  hvch  a  multitude  would 
require  at  least  two  hundred  denarii  (more  than  j£7)  ;  and  even  sup- 
posing that  they  possessed  such  a  sum  in  their  common  purse,  there 
was  now  neither  time  nor  opportunity  to  make  the  necessary  purchases. 
Andrew  hereupon  mentioned  that  there  was  a  little  boy  there  who  had 
five  barley-loaves  and  two  small  fishes,  but  he  only  said  it  in  a  despair- 
ing way,  and,  as  it  were,  to  show  the  utter  helplessness  of  the  only 
suggestion  which  occurred  to  him. 

"  Make  the  men  sit  down,"  was  the  brief  reply. 

Wondering  and  expectant,  the  Apostles  bade  the  multitude  recline, 
as  for  a  meal,  on  the  rich  green  grass  which  in  that  pleasant  spring- 
time clothed  the  hill-sides.  They  arranged  them  in  companies  of  fifty 
and  a  hundred,  and  as  they  sat  in  these  orderly  groups  upon  the  grass, 
the  gay  red  and  blue  and  yellow  colours  of  the  clothing  which  the 
poorest  Orientals  wear,  called  up  in  the  imagination  of  St.  Peter  a 
multitude  of  flower-beds  in  some  well-cultivated  garden.  And  then, 
standing  in  the  midst  of  His  guests — glad-hearted  at  the  work  of  mercy 
which  He  intended  to  perform — Jesus  raised  His  eyes  to  heaven,  gave 
thanks,  blessed  the  loaves,  broke  them  into  pieces,  and  began  to  dis- 
tribute them  to  His  disciples,  and  they  to  the  multitude ;  and  the  two 
fishes  He  divided  among  them  all.  It  was  a  humble  but  a  sufficient, 
and  to  hungry  wayfarers  a  delicious  ineal.  And  when  all  were  abun- 
dantly satisfied,  Jesus,  not  only  to  show  His  disciples  the  extent  and 
reality  of  what  had  been  done,  but  also  to  teach  them  the  memorable 
lesson  that  wastefulness,  even  of  miraculous  power,  is  wholly  alien  to 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  189 

the  Divine  economy,  bade  them  gather  up  the  fragments  that  remained, 
that  nothing  might  be  lost.  The  symmetrical  arrangement  of  the 
multitude  showed  that  about  five  thousand  men,  besides  women  and 
children,  had  been  fed,  and  yet  twelve  baskets  were  filled  with  what 
was  over  find  above  to  them  that  had  eaten. 

The  miracle  produced  a  profound  impression.  It  was  exactly  in 
accordance  with  the  current  expectation,  and  the  multitude  began  to 
whisper  to  each  other  that  this  must  undoubtedly  be  "  that  Prophet 
which  should  come  into  the  world ;  "  the  Shiloh  of  Jacob's  blessing ; 
the  Star  and  the  Sceptre  of  Balaam's  vision ;  the  Prophet  like  unto 
Moses  to  whom  they  were  to  hearken ;  perhaps  the  Elijah  promised  by 
the  dying  breath  of  ancient  prophecy  ;  perhaps  the  Jeremiah  of  their 
tradition,  come  back  to  reveal  the  hiding-place  of  the  Ark,  and  the 
Urim,  and  the  sacred  fire.  Jesus  marked  their  undisguised  admira- 
tion, and  the  danger  that  their  enthusiasm  might  break  out  by  force, 
and  precipitate  His  death  by  open  rebellion  against  the  Roman  govern- 
ment in  the  attempt  to  make  Him  a  king.  He  saw  too  that  His 
disciples  seemed  to  share  this  worldly  and  perilous  excitement.  The 
time  was  come,  therefore,  for  instant  action.  By  the  exercise  of  direct 
authority,  He  compelled  His  disciples  to  embark  in  their  boat,  and 
cross  the  Lake  before  Him  in  the  direction  of  Capernaum  or  the  western 
Bethsaida.  A  little  gentle  constraint  was  necessary,  for  they  were 
naturally  unwilling  to  leave  Him  among  the  excited  multitude  on  that 
lonely  shore,  and  if  anything  great  was  going  to  happen  to  Him 
they  felt  a  right  to  be  present.  On  the  other  hand,  it  was  more  easy 
for  Him  to  dismiss  the  multitude  when  they  had  seen  that  His  own 
immediate  friends  and  disciples  had  been  sent  away. 

So  in  the  gathering  dusk  He  gradually  and  gently  succeeded  in 
persuading  the  multitude  to  leave  Him,  and  when  all  but  the  most 
enthusiastic  had  streamed  away  to  their  homes  or  caravans,  He 
suddenly  left  the  rest,  and  fled  from  them  to  the  hill-top  alone  to  pray. 
He  was  conscious  that  a  solemn  and  awful  crisis  of  His  day  on  earth 
was  come,  and  by  communing  with  His  heavenly  Father,  He  would 
nerve  His  soul  for  the  stern  work  of  the  morrow,  and  the  bitter  conflict 
of  many  coming  weeks.  Once  before  He  had  spent  in  the  mountain 
solitudes  a  night  of  lonely  prayer,  but  then  it  was  before  the  choice  of 
His  beloved  Apostles,  and  the  glad  tidings  of  His  earliest  and  happiest 
ministry.  Far  different  were  the  feelings  with  which  the  Great  High 
Priest  now  climbed  the  rocky  stairs  of  that  great  mountain  altar  which 
in  His  temple  of  the  night  seemed  to  lift  Him  nearer  to  the  stars  of 


190  THE    LIFE    OP   CHEIST. 

God.  The  murder  of  His  beloved  forerunner  brought  home  to  His 
soul  more  nearly  the  thought  of  death ;  nor  was  He  deceived  by  this 
brief  blaze  of  a  falsely-founded  popularity,  which  on  the  next  day  He 
meant  to  quench.  The  storm  which  now  began  to  sweep  over  the 
barren  hills ;  the  winds  that  rushed  howling  down  the  ravines ;  the 
Lake  before  Him  buffeted  into  tempestuous  foam ;  the  little  boat 
which — as  the  moonlight  struggled  through  the  rifted  clouds — He  saw 
tossing  beneath  Him  on  the  labouring  waves,  were  all  too  sure  an 
emblem  of  the  altered  aspects  of  His  earthly  life.  But  there  on  the 
desolate  hill-top,  in  that  night  of  storm,  He  could  gain  strength  and 
peace  and  happiness  unspeakable ;  for  there  He  was  alone  with  Grod. 
And  so  over  that  figure,  bowed  in  lonely  prayer  upon  the  hills,  and 
over  those  toilers  upon  the  troubled  lake,  the  darkness  fell  and  the 
great  winds  blew. 

Hour  after  hour  passed  by.  It  was  now  the  fourth  watch  of  the 
night ;  the  ship  had  traversed  but  half  of  its  destined  course  ;  it  was 
dark,  and  the  wind  was  contrary,  and  the  waves  boisterous,  and  they 
were  distressed  with  toiling  at  the  oar,  and  above  all  there  was  no  one 
with  them  now  to  calm  and  save,  for  Jesus  was  alone  upon  the  land. 
Alone  upon  the  land,  and  they  were  tossing  on  the  perilous  sea  ;  but 
all  the  while  He  saw  and  pitied  them,  and  at  last,  in  their  worst 
extremity,  they  saw  a  gleam  in  the  darkness,  and  an  awful  figure, 
and  a  fluttering  robe,  and  One  drew  near  them,  treading  upon  the 
ridges  of  the  sea,  but  seemed  as  if  He  meant  to  pass  them  by ;  and 
they  cried  out  in  terror  at  the  sight,  thinking  that  it  was  a  phantom 
that  walked  upon  the  waves.  And  through  the  storm  and  darkness  to 
them — as  so  often  to  us,  when,  amid  the  darknesseF  of  life,  the  ocean 
seems  so  great,  and  our  little  boats  so  small — fcherp  shrilled  that  Voice 
of  peace,  which  said,  "  It  is  I :  be  not  afraid. ' 

That  Voice  stilled  their  terrors,  and  at  okce  they  were  eager  to 
receive  Him  into  the  ship;  but  Peter's  impetuous  love — the  strong 
yearning  of  him  who,  in  his  despairing  self -consciousness,  had  cried 
out  "Depart  from  me!" — now  cannot  even  await  His  approach,  and 
he  passionately  exclaims — 

"  Lord,  if  it  be  Thou,  bid  me  come  unto  Thee  on  the  water." 

"Come!" 

And  over  the  vessel's  side  into  the  troubled  waves  he  sprang,  and 
•while  his  eye  was  fixed  on  his  Lord,  the  wind  might  toss  his  hair, 
and  the  spray  might  drench  his  robes,  but  all  was  well ;  but  when, 
with  wavering  faith,  he  glanced  from  Him  to  the  furious  waves,  and 


THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  191 

to  the  gulfy  blackness  underneath,  then  he  began  to  sink,  and  in  an 
accent  of  despair — how  unlike  his  former  confidence  ! — he  faintly 
cried,  "  Lord,  save  me ! "  Nor  did  Jesus  fail.  Instantly,  with  a  smile 
of  pity,  He  stretched  out  His  hand,  and  grasped  the  hand  of  His 
drowning  disciple  with  the  gentle  rebuke,  "  0  thou  of  little  faith,  why 
didst  thou  doubt  ?  "  And  so,  his  love  satisfied,  but  his  over-confidence 
rebuked,  they  climbed — the  Lord  and  His  abashed  Apostle — into  the 
boat;  and  the  wind  lulled,  and  amid  the  ripple  of  waves  upon  a 
moonlit  shore,  they  were  at  the  haven  where  they  would  be  ;  and  all 
— the  crew  as  well  as  His  disciples — were  filled  with  deeper  and  deeper 
amazement,  and  some  of  them,  addressing  Him  by  a  title  which 
Nathanael  alone  had  applied  to  Him  before,  exclaimed,  "  Truly  Thou 
art  the  Son  of  God." 

Let  us  pause  a  moment  longer  over  this  wonderful  narrative, 
perhaps  of  all  others  the  most  difficult  for  our  feeble  faith  to  believe 
or  understand.  Some  have  tried  in  various  methods  to  explain  away 
its  miraculous  character ;  they  have  laboured  to  show  that  eTrl  rrjv 
6a\a<r<rav  may  mean  no  more  than  that  Jesus  walked  along  the  shore 
parallel  to  the  vessel ;  or  even  that,  in  the  darkness,  the  Apostles  may 
have  thought  at  first  that  He  was,  or  had  been,  walking  upon  the  sea. 
Such  subterfuges  are  idle  and  superfluous.  If  any  man  find  himself 
unable  to  believe  in  miracles — if  he  even  think  it  wrong  to  try  and 
acquire  the  faith  which  accepts  them — then  let  him  be  thoroughly 
convinced  in  his  own  mind,  and  cling  honestly  to  the  truth  as  he  con- 
ceives it. 

It  is  not  for  us,  or  for  any  man,  to  judge  another :  to  his  own 
Master  he  standeth  or  falleth.  But  let  him  not  attempt  to  foist 
such  disbelief  into  the  plain  narrative  of  the  Evangelists.  That  they 
intended  to  describe  an  amazing  miracle  is  indisputable  to  any  one  who 
carefully  reads  their  words ;  and,  as  I  have  said  before,  if,  believing  in 
God,  we  believe  in  a  Divine  Providence  over  the  lives  of  men — and, 
believing  in  that  Divine  Providence,  believe  in  the  miraculous — and, 
believing  in  the  miraculous,  accept  as  truth  the  resurrection  of  our 
Lord  Jesus  Christ — and,  believing  that  resurrection,  believe  that  He 
was  indeed  the  Son  of  God — then,  however  deeply  we  may  realise  the 
beauty  and  the  wonder  and  the  power  of  natural  laws,  we  realise  yet 
more  deeply  the  power  of  Him  who  holds  those  laws,  and  all  which 
they  have  evolved,  in  the  hollow  of  His  hand  ;  and  to  us  the  miraculous, 
when  thus  attested,  will  be  in  no  way  more  stupendous  than  the 
natural,  nor  shall  we  find  it  an  impossible  conception  that  He  who 


192  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

sent  His  Son  to  earth  to  die  for  us  should  have  put  all  authority  into 
His  hand. 

So  then  if,  like  Peter,  we  fix  our  eyes  on  Jesus,  we  too  may  walk 
triumphantly  over  the  swelling  waves  of  disbelief,  and  unterrified  amid 
the  rising  winds  of  doubt ;  but  if  we  turn  away  our  eyes  from  Him  in 
whom  we  have  believed — if,  as  it  is  so  easy  to  do,  and  as  we  are  so 
much  tempted  to  do,  we  look  rather  at  the  power  and  fury  of  those 
terrible  and  destructive  elements  than  at  Him  who  can  help  and  save 
— then  we  too  shall  inevitably  sink.  Oh,  if  tfce  feel,  often  and  often, 
that  the  water-floods  threaten  to  drown  us,  and  the  deep  to  swallow  up 
the  tossed  vessel  of  our  Church  and  Faith,  may  it  again  and  again  be 
granted  us  to  hear  amid  the  storm  and  the  darkness,  and  the  voices 
prophesying  war,  those  two  sweetest  of  the  Saviour's  utterances — 

"  Fear  not.     Only  believe." 

"  It  is  I.     Be  not  afraid." 


CHAPTER  XXX. 

THE   DISCOURSE   AT   CAPERNAUM. 

THE  dawn  of  that  day  broke  on  one  of  the  saddest  episodes  of  our 
Saviour's  life.  It  was  the  day  in  the  synagogue  at  Capernaum  on 
which  he  deliberately  scattered  the  mists  and  exhalations  of  such 
spurious  popularity  as  the  Miracle  of  the  Loaves  had  gathered  about 
His  person  and  His  work,  and  put  not  only  His  idle  followers,  but 
some  even  of  His  nearer  disciples,  to  a  test  under  which  their  love  for 
Him  entirely  failed.  That  discourse  in  the  synagogue  forms  a  marked 
crisis  in  His  career.  It  was  followed  by  manifestations  of  surprised 
dislike,  which  were  as  the  first  muttering  of  that  storm  of  hatred  and 
persecution  which  was  henceforth  to  burst  over  His  head. 

We  have  seen  already  that  some  of  the  multitude,  filled  with  vague 
wonder  and  insatiable  curiosity,  had  lingered  on  the  little  plain  by 
Bethsaida  Julias  that  they  might  follow  the  movements  of  Jesus,  and 
share  in.  the  blessings  of  triumphs  of  which  they  expected  an  imme- 
diate manifestation.  They  had  seen  Him  dismiss  His  disciples,  and 
had  perphaps  caught  glimpses  of  Him  as  He  climbed  the  hill  alone ; 


THE    LIFE    OB'    CHRIST.  193 

they  had  observed  that  the  wind  was  contrary,  and  that  no  other  boat 
but  that  of  the  Apostles  had  left  the  shore ;  they  made  sure,  therefore, 
of  finding  Him  somewhere  on  the  hills  above  the  plain.  Yet  when  the 
morning  dawned  they  saw  no  trace  of  Him  either  on  plain  or  hill. 
Meanwhile  some  little  boats — perhaps  driven  across  by  the  same  gale 
which  had  retarded  the  opposite  course  of  the  disciples — had  arrived 
from  Tiberias.  They  availed  themselves  of  these  to  cross  over  to 
Capernaum ;  and  there,  already  in  the  early  morning,  they  found  Him, 
after  all  the  fatigues  and  agitations  of  yesterday — after  the  day  of 
sad  tidings  and  ceaseless  toil,  after  the  night  of  stormy  solitude  and 
ceaseless  prayer — calmly  seated,  and  calmly  teaching,  in  the  familiar 
synagogue. 

"  Rabbi,  when  didst  thou  get  hither  ?  "  is  the  expression  of  their 
natural  surprise ;  but  it  is  met  with  perfect  silence.  The  miracle  of 
walking  on  the  water  was  one  of  necessity  and  mercy ;  it  in  no  way 
concerned  them  ;  it  was  not  in  any  way  intended  for  them ;  nor  was  it 
mainly  or  essentially  as  a  worker  of  miracles  that  Christ  wished  to 
claim  their  allegiance  or  convince  their  minds.  And,  therefore,  read- 
ing their  hearts,  knowing  that  they  were  seeking  Him  in  the  very 
spirit  which  He  most  disliked,  He  quietly  drew  aside  the  veil  of 
perdaps  half-unconscious  hypocrisy  which  hid  them  from  themselves, 
and  reproached  them  for  seeking  Him  only  for  what  they  could  get 
from  Him — "  not  because  ye  saw  signs,  but  because  ye  ate  of  the 
loaves  and  were  satisfied."  He  who  never  rejected  the  cry  of  the 
sufferer,  or  refused  to  answer  the  question  of  the  faithful — He  who 
would  never  break  the  bruised  reed,  or  quench  the  smoking  flax — at 
once  rejected  the  false  eye-service  of  mean  self-interest  and  vulgar 
curiosity.  Yet  He  added  for  their  sakes  the  eternal  lesson,  "  Labour 
ye  not  for  the  meat  which  perisheth,  but  for  the  meat  which  remaineth 
to  eternal  life,  which  the  Son  of  Man  shall  give  you ;  for  Him  the 
Father — even  God — hath  sealed." 

It  seems  as  if  at  first  they  were  touched  and  ashamed.  He  had 
read  their  hearts  aright,  and  they  ask  Him,  "  What  are  we  to  do  that 
we  may  work  the  works  of  God  ?  " 

"  This  is  the  work  of  God,  that  ye  believe  on  Him  whom  He  hath 
sent."  "But  what  sign  would  Jesus  give  them  that  they  should 
believe  in  Him  ?  Their  fathers  ate  the  manna  in  the  wilderness, 
which  David  had  called  bread  from  heaven."  The  inference  was 
obvious.  Moses  had  given  them  manna  from  heaven.  Jesus  as  yet — 
they  hinted — had  only  given  them  barley  loaves  of  earth.  But  if  He 


194  THE   LIFE   OF   CHEIST. 

•were  the  true  Messiah,  was  He  not,  according  to  all  the  legends  of 
their  nation,  to  enrich  and  crown  them,  and  to  banquet  them  on  pome- 
granates from  Eden,  and  "  a  vineyard  of  red  wine,"  and  upon  the  flesh 
•  of  Behemoth  and  Leviathan,  and  the  great  bird  Bar  Juchne  ?  Might 
not  the  very  psalm  which  they  had  quoted  have  taught  them 
how  worse  than  useless  it  would  have  been  if  Jesus  had  given  them 
manna,  which,  in  their  coarse  literalism,  they  supposed  to  be  in  reality 
angels'  food  ?  Is  not  David  in  that  psalm  expressly  showing  that  to 
grant  them  one  such  blessing  was  only  to  make  them  ask  greedily  for 
more,  and  that  if  God  had  given  their  fathers  more,  it  was  only 
because  "  they  believed  not  in  God,  and  put  not  their  trust  in  His 
help ;  "  but  "  while  the  meat  was  yet  in  their  mouths,  the  heavy 
wrath  of  God  came  upon  them,  and  slew  the  mightiest  of  them,  and 
smote  down  the  chosen  men  that  were  in  Israel."  And  does  not 
David  show  that  in  spite  of,  and  before,  and  after,  this  wrathful 
granting  to  them  to  the  full  of  their  own  hearts'  lusts,  so  far  from 
believing  and  being  humble,  they  only  sinned  yet  more  and  more 
against  Him,  and  provoked  Him  more  and  more  ?  Had  not  all  the 
past  history  of  their  nation  proved  decisively  that  faith  must  rest  on 
deeper  foundations  than  signs  and  miracles,  and  that  the  evil  heart  of 
unbelief  must  be  stirred  by  nobler  emotions  than  astonishment  at  the 
outstretched  hand  and  the  mighty  arm  ? 

But  Jesus  led  them  at  once  to  loftier  regions  than  those  of 
historical  conviction.  He  tells  them  that  He  who  had  given  them 
the  manna  was  not  Moses,  but  God ;  and  that  the  manna  was  only  in 
poetic  metaphor  bread  from  heaven ;  but  that  His  Father,  the  true 
giver,  was  giving  them  the  true  bread  from  heaven  even  now — even 
the  bread  of  God  which  came  down  from  heaven,  and  was  giving  life 
to  the  world. 

Their  minds  still  fastened  to  mere  material  images — their  hopes 
still  running  on  mere  material  benefits — they  ask  for  this  bread  from 
heaven  as  eagerly  as  the  woman  of  Samaria  had  asked  for  the  water 
which  quenches  all  thirst.  "  Lord,  now  and  always  give  us  this 
bread." 

Jesus  said  to  them,  "  I  am  the  bread  of  life.  Ho  that  cometh  to 
me  shall  never  hunger,  and  he  that  believeth  on  me  shall  never 
thirst;"  and  He  proceeds  to  point  out  to  them  that  He  came  to  do 
the  Father's  will,  and  that  His  will  was  that  all  who  came  to  His  Son 
thould  have  eternal  life. 

Then  the  old  angry  murmurs  burst  out  again — not  this  time  from 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  105 

the  vulgar-minded  multitude,  bat  from  His  old  opponents  the  leading 
Jews — "  How  conld  He  say  that  He  came  down  from  heaven  ?  How 
could  He  call  Himself  the  bread  of  life  ?  Was  He  not  Jesus,  the  son 
of  Joseph,  the  carpenter  of  Nazareth  ?  " 

Jesus  never  met  these  murmurs  about  His  supposed  parentage  and 
place  of  birth  by  revealing  to  the  common  crowds  the  high  mystery  of 
His  earthly  origin.  He  thought  not  equality  with  God  a  thing  to  be 
seized  by  Him.  He  was  in  no  hurry  to  claim  His  own  Divinity,  or 
demand  the  homage  which  was  its  due.  He  would  let  the  splendour 
of  His  Divine  nature  dawn  on  men  gradually,  not  at  first  in  all  its 
noonday  brightness,  but  gently  as  the  light  of  morning  through  His 
word  and  works.  In  the  fullest  and  deepest  sense  "He  emptied 
Himself  of  His  glory.1' 

But  He  met  the  murmurers,  as  He  always  did,  by  a  stronger, 
fuller,  clearer  declaration  of  the  very  truth  which  they  rejected.  It 
was  thus  that  He  had  dealt  with  Nicodemus ;  it  was  thus  that  He  had 
taught  the  woman  of  Samaria;  it  was  thus  also  that  He  answered 
the  Temple  doctors  who  arraigned  His  infringement  of  their  sabbatic 
rules.  But  the  timid  Rabbi  and  the  erring  woman  had  been  faithful 
enough  and  earnest  enough  to  look  deeper  into  His  words  and  humbly 
seek  their  meaning,  and  so  to  be  guided  into  truth.  N"ot  so  with  these 
listeners.  God  had  drawn  them  to  Christ,  and  they  had  rejected  His 
gracious  drawing  without  which  they  could  not  come.  When  Jesus 
reminded  them  that  the  manna  was  no  life-giving  substance,  since 
their  fathers  had  eaten  thereof  and  were  dead,  but  that  He  was  Him- 
self the  bread  of  life,  of  which  all  who  eat  should  live  for  ever ;  and 
when,  in  language  yet  more  startling,  He  added  that  the  bread  was 
Hie  flesh  which  He  would  give  for  the  life  of  the  world — then,  instead 
of  seeking  the  true  significance  of  that  deep  metaphor,  they  made  it 
a  matter  of  mere  verbal  criticism,  and  only  wrangled  together  about 
the  idle  question,  "  How  can  this  man  give  us  His  flesh  to  eat  ?  " 

Thus  they  were  carnally-minded,  and  to  be  carnally-minded  is 
death.  They  did  not  seek  the  truth,  and  it  was  more  and  more  taken 
from  them.  They  had  nothing,  and  therefore  from  them  was  taken 
even  what  they  had.  In  language  yet  more  emphatic,  under  figures 
yet  more  startling,  in  their  paradox,  Jesus  said  to  them,  "  Except  ye 
eat  the  flesh  of  the  Son  of  Man,  and  drink  His  blood,  ye  have  no  life 
in  you ; "  and  again,  as  a  still  further  enforcement  and  expansion  of 
the  same  great  truths — "  He  that  eateth  of  this  bread  shall  live  for 
ever." 

o  2 


196  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

No  doubt  the  words  were  difficult,  and,  to  those  who  came  in  a 
hard  and  false  spirit,  offensive ;  no  doubt  also  the  death  and  passion  of 
our  Saviour  Christ,  and  the  mystery  of  that  Holy  Sacrament,  in  which, 
we  spiritually  eat  His  flesh  and  drink  His  blood,  has  enabled  us  more 
clearly  to  understand  His  meaning ;  yet  there  was  in  the  words  which 
He  had  used,  enough,  and  more  than  enough,  to  shadow  forth  to  every 
attentive  hearer  the  great  truth,  already  familiar  to  them  from  their 
own  Law,  that  "  Man  doth  not  live  by  bread  alone,  but  by  every  word 
that  proceedeth  out  of  the  mouth  of  God  ; "  and  the  further  truth 
that  eternal  life,  the  life  of  the  soul,  was  to  be  found  in  the  deepest 
and  most  intimate  of  all  conceivable  communions  with,  the  life  and 
teaching  of  Him  who  spake.  And  it  must  be  remembered  that  if  the 
Lord's  Supper  has,  for  us,  thrown  a  clearer  light  upon  the  meaning  of 
this  discourse,  on  the  other  hand  the  metaphors  which  Jesus  used  had 
not,  to  an  educated  Jew,  one-hundredth  part  of  the  strangeness  which, 
they  have  to  us.  Jewish  literature  was  exceedingly  familiar  with  the 
symbolism  which  represented  by  "  eating  "  an  entire  acceptance  of  and 
incorporation  with  the  truth,  and  by  "  bread "  a  spiritual  doctrine. 
Even  the  mere  pictorial  genius  of  the  Hebrew  language  gave  the  clue 
to  the  right  interpretation.  Those  who  heard  Christ  in  the  synagogue 
of  Capernaum  must  almost  involuntarily  have  recalled  similar  expres- 
sions in  their  own  prophets ;  and  since  the  discourse  was  avowedly 
parabolic — since  Jesus  had  expressly  excluded  all  purely  sensual  and 
Judaic  fancies — it  is  quite  clear  that  much  of  their  failure  to  compre- 
hend Him  rose  not  from  the  understanding,  but  from  the  will.  His 
saying  was  hard,  as  St.  Augustine  remarks,  only  to  the  hard  ;  and  in- 
credible only  to  the  incredulous.  For  if  bread  be  the  type  of  all  earthly 
sustenance,  then  the  "  bread  of  heaven  "  may  well  express  all  spiritual 
sustenance,  all  that  involves  and  supports  eternal  life.  Now  the  lesson 
which  He  wished  to  teach  them  was  th'w — that  eternal  life  is  in  the  Son 
of  God.  They,  therefore,  that  would  have  eternal  life  must  partake  of 
the  bread  of  heaven,  or — to  use  the  other  and  deeper  image — must  eat 
the  flesh  and  drink  the  blood  of  the  Son  of  Man.  They  must  feed  on 
Him  in  their  hearts  by  faith.  They  might  accept  or  reject  the  truth 
which  He  was  revealing  to  their  consciences,  but  there  could  be  no 
possible  excuse  for  their  pretended  incapacity  to  understand  its 
meaning. 

There  is  a  teaching  which  is,  and  is  intended  to  be,  not  only 
instructive  but  probationary ;  of  which  the  immediate  purpose  is  not 
only  to  teach,  but  to  test.  Such  had  been  the  object  of  this  memorable 


THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  197 

discourse.  To  comprehend  it  rightly  required  an  effort  not  only  of  the 
understanding,  but  also  of  the  will.  It  was  meant  to  put  an  end  to  the 
merely  selfish  hopes  of  that  "  rabble  of  obtrusive  chiliasts  "  whose 
irreverent  devotion  was  a  mere  cloak  for  worldliness ;  it  was  meant 
also  to  place  before  the  Jewish  authorities  words  which  they  were  too 
full  of  hatred  and  materialism  to  understand.  But  its  sifting  power 
went  deeper  than  this.  Some  even  of  the  disciples  found  the  saying 
harsh  and  repulsive.  They  did  not  speak  out  openly,  but  Jesus 
recognised  their  discontent,  and  when  He  had  left  the  synagogue, 
opoke  to  them,  in  this  third  and  concluding  part  of  His  discourse,  at 
once  more  gently  and  less  figuratively  than  He  had  done  to  the  others. 
To  these  He  prophesied  of  that  future  ascension,  which  should  prove 
to  them  that  He  had  indeed  come  down  from  heaven,  and  that  the 
words  about  His  flesh — which  should  then  be  taken  into  heaven — could 
only  have  a  figurative  meaning.  Nay,  with  yet  further  compassion 
for  their  weakness,  He  intimated  to  them  the  significance  of  those 
strong  metaphors  in  which  He  had  purposely  veiled  His  words  from 
the  curious  eyes  of  selfishness  and  the  settled  malice  of  opposition.  In 
one  sentence  which  is  surely  the  key-note  of  all  that  had  gone  before 
— in  a  sentence  which  surely  renders  nugatory  much  of  the  pseudo- 
mystical  and  impossibly-elaborate  exegesis  by  which  the  plain  meaning 
of  this  chapter  has  been  obscured,  He  added — 

"  It  is  the  spirit  that  quickeneth ;  the  flesh  profiteth  nothing  : 
the  words  that  I  speak  unto  you,  they  are  spirit,  and  tltey  are  life."  Why 
then  had  they  found  His  words  so  hard  ?  He  tells  them :  it  was 
because  some  of  them  believed  not ;  it  was  because,  as  He  had  already 
told  the  Jews,  the  spirit  of  faith  is  a  gift  and  grace  of  God,  which 
gift  these  murmurers  were  rejecting,  against  which  grace  they  were 
struggling  even  now. 

And  from  that  time  many  of  them  left  Him ;  many  who  had  hitherto 
sought  Him,  many  who  were  not  far  from  the  kingdom  of  heaven. 
Even  in  the  midst  of  crowds  His  life  was  to  be  lonelier  thenceforth, 
because  there  would  be  fewer  to  know  and  love  Him.  In  deep  sadness 
of  heart  He  addressed  to  the  Twelve  the  touching  question,  "  Will  ye 
also  go  away  ?  "  It  was  Simon  Peter  whose  warm  heart  spoke  out 
impetuously  for  all  the  rest.  He  at  least  had  rightly  apprehended  that 
strange  discourse  at  which  so  many  had  stumbled.  "Lord,"  he  ex- 
claims, "to  whom  shall  we  go?  THOU  HAST  THE  WORDS  OF  ETERNAL 
LIFE.  But  we  believe  and  are  sure  that  Thou  art  the  Holy  One  of 
God." 


103  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

It  was  a  noble  confession,  but  at  that  bitter  moment  the  heart  of 
Jesus  was  heavily  oppressed,  and  He  only  answered — 

"  Have  not  I  chosen  you  twelve,  and  one  of  you  is  a  devil  ?  " 

The  expression  was  terribly  strong,  and  the  absence  of  all  direct 
parallels  render  it  difficult  for  us  to  understand  its  exact  significance. 
But  although  it  was  afterwards  known  that  the  reproach  was  aimed  at 
Judas,  yet  it  is  doubtful  whether  at  the  actual  time  any  were  aware  of 
this  except  the  traitor  himself. 

Many  false  or  half-sincere  disciples  had  left  Him  :  might  not  these 
words  have  been  graciously  meant  to  furnish  one  more  opportunity  to 
the  hard  and  impure  soul  of  the  man  of  Kerioth,  so  that  before  being 
plunged  into  yet  deeper  and  more  irreparable  guilt,  lie  might  leave 
Him  too  ?  If  so,  the  warning  was  rejected.  In  deadly  sin  against  his 
own  conscience,  Judas  stayed  to  heap  up  for  himself  wrath  "  against 
the  day  of  wrath,  and  revelation  of  the  righteous  judgment  of  God." 


CHAPTER    XXXI. 

GATHERING     OPPOSITION. 

ALTHOUGH  the  discourse  which  we  have  just  narrated  formed  a  marked 
period  in  our  Lord's  ministry,  and  although  from  this  time  forward 
the  clouds  gather  more  and  more  densely  about  His  course,  yet  it 
must  not  be  supposed  that  this  was  the  first  occasion,  even  in  Gfalilee, 
on  which  enmity  against  His  person  and  teaching  had  been  openly 
displayed. 

1.  The  earliest  traces  of  doubt  and  disaffection  arose  from  the 
expression  which  He  used  on  several  occasions,  "  Thy  sins  be  forgiven 
thce."  It  was  in  these  words  that  He  had  addressed  the  woman  that 
was  a  sinner,  and  the  sick  of  the  palsy.  On  both  occasions  the 
address  had  excited  astonishment  and  disapproval,  and  at  Simon's 
house,  where  this  had  found  no  open  expression,  and  where  no  miracle 
had  been  wrought,  Jesus  gently  substituted  another  expression.  But 
it  was  not  so  at  the  healing  of  the  palsied  man;  there  an  open  murmur 
had  arisen  among  the  Scribes  and  Pharisees  ;  and  there,  revealing 


THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  199 

more  of  His  true  majesty,  Jesus,  by  His  power  of  working  miracles, 
had  vindicated  His  right  to  forgive  sins.  The  argument  was  unanswer- 
able, for  not  only  did  the  prevalent  belief  connect  sickness  in  every 
instance  with  actual  sin,  but  also  it  was  generally  maintained,  even  by 
the  Rabbis,  "  that  no  sick  man  is  healed  from  his  disease  until  all  his 
sins  have  been  forgiven."  It  was,  therefore,  in  full  accordance  with 
their  own  notions  that  He  who  by  His  own  authority  could  heal 
diseases  could  also  by  His  own  authority  pronounce  that  sins  were 
forgiven.  It  was  true  that  they  could  hardly  conceive  of  either 
healing  or  forgiveness  conveyed  in  such  irregular  channels,  and 
without  the  paraphernalia  of  sacrifices,  and  without  the  need  of 
sacerdotal  interventions.  But,  disagreeable  as  such  proceedings  were 
to  their  well-regulated  minds,  the  fact  remained  that  the  cures  were 
actually  wrought,  and  were  actually  attested  by  hundreds  of  living 
witnesses.  It  was  felt,  therefore,  that  this  ground  of  opposition  was 
wholly  untenable,  and  it  was  tacitly  abandoned.  To  urge  that  there 
was  "  blasphemy  "  in  His  expressions  would  only  serve  to  bring  into 
greater  prominence  that  there  was  miracle  in  His  acts. 

Nor,  again,  do  they  seem  to  have  pressed  the  charge,  preserved  for 
us  only  by  our  Lord's  own  allusion,  that  He  was  "  a  glutton  and  a 
wine- drinker."  The  charge  was  far  too  flagrantly  false  and  malicious 
to  excite  any  prejudice  against  one  who,  although  He  did  not  adopt 
the  stern  asceticism  of  John,  yet  lived  a  life  of  the  extremest  simpli- 
city, and  merely  did  what  was  done  by  the  most  scrupulous  Pharisees 
in  accepting  the  invitations  to  feasts,  where  He  had  constantly  fresh 
opportunities  of  teaching  and  doing  good.  The  calumny  was,  in  fact, 
destroyed  when  He  had  shown  that  the  men  of  that  generation  were 
like  wayward  and  peevish  children  whom  nothing  could  conciliate, 
charging  Jesus  with  intemperance  because  He  did  not  avoid  an 
innocent  festivity,  and  John  with  demoniac  possession  because  he 
set  his  face  against  social  corruptions. 

3.  Nor,  once  more,  did  they  press  the  charge  of  His  not  fasting. 
In  making  that  complaint  they  had  hoped  for  the  powerful  aid  of 
John's  disciples ;  but  when  these  had  been  convinced,  by  the  words  of 
their  own  prophet,  how  futile  and  unreasonable  was  their  complaint, 
the  Pharisees  saw  that  it  was  useless  to  found  a  charge  upon  the 
neglect  of  a  practice  which  was  not  only  unrecognised  in  the  Mosaic 
law,  but  which  some  of  their  own  noblest  and  wisest  teachers  had  not 
encouraged.  The  fact  that  Jesus  did  not  require  His  disciples  to  fast 
would  certainly  cause  no  forfeiture  of  the  popular  sympathy,  and 


200  THE    LIFE    OF    CHRIST. 

could  not  be  urged  to  His  discredit  even  before  a  synagogue  or  a 
Sanhedrin. 

4.  A  deeper  and  more  lasting  offence  was  caused,  and  a  far  more 
deadly  opposition  stimulated,  by  Christ's  choice  of  Matthew  as  an 
Apostle,  and  by  His  deliberate  tolerance  of — it  might  almost  be  said 
preference  for — the  society  of  publicans  and  sinners.  Among  the 
Jews  of  that  day  the  distinctions  of  religious  life  created  a  barrier 
almost  as  strong  as  that  of  caste.  No  less  a  person  than  Hillel  had 
said  that  "no  ignorant  person  could  save  himself  from  sin,  and  no 
'  man  of  the  people  '  be  pious."  A  scrupulous  Jew  regarded  the  multi- 
tude of  his  own  nation  who  "  knew  not  the  Law  "  as  accursed ;  and 
just  as  every  Jew,  holding  himself  to  be  a  member  of  a  royal  genera- 
tion and  a  peculiar  people,  looked  on  the  heathen  world  with  the 
sovereign  disdain  of  an  exclusiveness  founded  on  the  habits  of  a 
thousand  years,  so  the  purist  faction  regarded  their  more  careless  and 
offending  brethren  as  being  little,  if  at  all,  better  than  the  very  heathen. 
Tet  here  was  one  who  mingled  freely  and  familiarly — mingled  without 
one  touch  of  hauteur  or  hatred — among  offensive  publicans  and  flagrant 
sinners.  Nay,  more,  He  suffered  women,  out  of  whom  had  been  cast 
seven  devils,  to  accompany  Him  in  His  journeys,  and  harlots  to  bathe 
His  feet  with  tears  !  *  How  different  from  the  Pharisees,  who  held  that 
there  was  pollution  in  the  mere  touch  of  those  who  had  themselves 
been  merely  touched  by  the  profane  populace,  and  who  had  laid  down 
the  express  rule  that  no  one  ought  to  receive  a  guest  into  his  house  if 
he  suspected  him  of  being  a  sinner ! 

Early  in  His  ministry,  Jesus,  with  a  divine  and  tender  irony,  had  met 
the  accusation  by  referring  them  to  His  favourite  passage  of  Scripture 
— that  profound  utterance  of  the  prophet  Hosea,  of  which  He  bade 
them  "  go  and  learn  "  the  meaning — "  I  will  have  mercy  and  not  sacri- 
fices." He  had  further  rebuked  at  once  their  unkindliness  and  their 
self-satisfaction  by  the  proverb,  "  They  that  be  whole  need  not  a  phy- 
sician, but  they  that  are  sick."  The  objection  did  not,  however,  die 
away.  In  His  later  days,  when  he  was  journeying  to  Jerusalem,  these 
incessant  enemies  again  raised  the  wrathful  and  scornful  murmur, 
"  This  man  receiveth  sinners  and  eateth  with  them  ;  "  and  then  it  was 
tliat  Jesus  answered  them  and  justified  His  ways,  and  revealed  more 
clearly  and  more  lovingly  than  had  ever  been  done  before  the  purpose 
of  God's  love  towards  repentant  sinners,  in  those  three  exquisite  and 
memorable  parables,  the  lost  sheep,  the  lost  piece  of  money,  and,  above 
all,  the  prodigal  son.  Drawn  from  the  simplest  elements  of  daily 


THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  201 

experience,  these  parables,  and  the  last  especially,  illustrated,  and 
illustrated  for  ever,  in  a  rising  climax  of  tenderness,  the  deepest 
mysteries  of  the  Divine  compassion — the  joy  that  there  is  in  heaven 
over  one  sinner  that  repenteth.  Where,  in  the  entire  range  of 
human  literature,  sacred  or  profane,  can  anything  be  found  so  terse, 
so  luminous,  so  full  of  infinite  tenderness — so  faithful  in  the  picture 
which  it  furnishes  of  the  consequences  of  sin,  yet  so  merciful  in  the 
hope  which  it  affords  to  amendment  and  penitence — as  this  little 
story?  How  does  it  summarise  the  consolations  of  religion  and 
the  sufferings  of  life !  All  sin  and  punishment,  all  penitence  and 
forgiveness,  find  their  best  delineation  in  these  few  brief  words.  The 
radical  differences  of  temperament  and  impulse  which  separate  different 
classes  of  men — the  spurious  independence  of  a  restless  free-will 
— the  preference  of  the  enjoyments  of  the  present  to  all  hopes  of  the 
future — the  wandering  far  away  from  that  pure  and  peaceful  region 
which  is  indeed  our  home,  in  order  to  let  loose  every  lower  passion  in 
the  riotous  indulgence  which  wastes  and  squanders  the  noblest  gifts  of 
life — the  brief  continuance  of  those  fierce  spasms  of  forbidden  pleasure 
— the  consuming  hunger,  the  scorching  thirst,  the  helpless  slavery,  the 
unutterable  degradation,  the  uncompassionated  anguish  that  must 
inevitably  ensue — where  have  these  myriad-times-repeated  experiences 
of  sin  and  sorrow  been  ever  painted — though  here  painted  in  a  few 
touches  only — by  a  hand  more  tender  and  more  true  than  in  the 
picture  of  that  foolish  boy  demanding  prematurely  the  share  which  he 
claims  of  his  father's  goods ;  journeying  into  a  far  country,  wasting 
his  substance  with  riotous  living  ;  suffering  from  want  in  the  mighty 
famine  ;  forced  to  submit  to  the  foul  infamy  of  feeding  swine,  and  fain 
to  fill  his  belly  with  the  swine-husks  which  no  man  gave.  And  then 
the  coming  to  himself,  the  memory  of  his  father's  meanest  servants 
who  had  enough  and  to  spare,  the  return  homewards,  the  agonised 
confession,  the  humble,  contrite,  heartbroken  entreaty,  and  that  never- 
to-be-eqnalled  climax  which,  like  a  sweet  voice  from  heaven,  has 
touched  so  many  million  hearts  to  penitence  and  tears — 

"  And  he  arose  and  came  to  his  father.  But  when  he  was  yet  a 
great  way  off  his  father  saw  him  and  had  compassion,  and  ran,  and  fell 
on  his  neck,  and  kissed  him.  And  the  son  said  unto  him,  Father,  I  have 
sinned  against  heaven,  and  in  thy  sight,  and  am  no  more  worthy  to  be 
called  thy  son.  But  the  father  said  to  the  servants,  Bring  forth  the 
best  robe  and  put  it  on  him,  and  put  a  ring  on  his  hand  and  shoes  on 
his  feet :  and  bring  hither  the  fatted  calf  and  kill  it ;  and  let  us  eat  and 


202  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

be  merry  :  for  this  my  son  was  dead  and  is  alive  again,  was  lost  and  is 
found." 

And  since  no  strain  could  rise  into  sweeter  and  nobler  tenderness — 
since  death  itself  could  reveal  no  lovelier  or  more  consolatory  lesson 
than  it  conveys  to  sinful  man — to  us  it  might  seem  that  this  is  the  true 
climax  of  the  parable,  and  that  here  it  should  end  as  with  the  music  of 
angel  harps.  And  here  it  would  have  ended  had  the  mystery  of 
human  malice  and  perversity  been  other  than  it  is.  But  the  conclusion 
of  it  bears  most  directly  on  the  very  circumstances  that  called  it  forth. 
The  angry  murmur  of  the  Pharisees  and  Scribes  had  shown  how  utterly 
ignorant  they  were,  in  their  cold  dead  hardness  and  pride  of  heart, 
that,  in  the  sight  of  God,  the  tear  of  one  truly  repentant  sinner  is 
transcendently  dearer  than  the  loveless  and  fruitless  formalism  of  a 
thousand  Pharisees.  Little  did  they  suspect  that  penitence  can  bring 
the  very  harlot  and  publican  into  closer  communion  with  their 
Maker  than  the  combined  excellence  of  a  thousand  vapid  and  respect- 
able hypocrisies.  And  therefore  it  was  that  Jesus  added  how  the 
elder  son  came  in,  and  was  indignant  at  the  iioise  of  merriment,  and 
was  angry  at  that  ready  forgiveness,  and  reproached  the  tender  heart 
of  his  father,  and  dragged  up  again  in  their  worst  form  the  forgiven 
sins  of  this  brother  whom  he  would  not  acknowledge,  and  showed  all 
the  narrow  unpardoning  malignity  of  a  heart  which  had  mistaken 
external  rectitude  for  holy  love.  Such  self-righteous  malice,  such 
pitiless  and  repulsive  respectability,  is  an  evil  more  inveterate — a  sore 
more  difficult  to  probe,  and  more  hard  to  cure — than  open  disobedience 
and  passionate  sin.  And  truly,  when  we  read  this  story,  and  meditate 
deeply  over  all  that  it  implies,  we  may,  from  our  hearts,  thank  God 
that  He  who  can  bring  good  out  of  the  worst  evil — honey  out  of  the 
slain  lion,  and  water  out  of  the  flinty  rock — could,  even  from  an 
exhibition  of  such  a  spirit  as  this,  draw  His  materials  for  the  divinest 
utterance  of  all  revelation — the  parable  of  the  prodigal  son. 

The  relation  of  Jesus  to  publicans  and  sinners  was  thus  explained, 
and  also  the  utter  antagonism  between  His  spirit  and  that  inflated 
religionism  which  is  the  wretched  and  hollow  counterfeit  of  all  real 
religion.  The  Judaism  of  that  day  substituted  empty  forms  and 
meaningless  ceremonies  for  true  righteousness;  it  mistook  uncharitable 
exclusiveness  for  genuine  purity;  it  delighted  to  sun  itself  in  the 
injustice  of  an  imagined  favouritism  from  which  it  would  fain  have 
shut  out  all  God's  other  children;  it  was  so  profoundly  hypocritical 
as  not  even  to  recognise  its  own  hypocrisy ;  it  never  thought  so  well 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  203 

of  itself  as  when  it  was  crushing  the  broken  reed  and  trampling  out 
the  last  spark  from  the  smoking  flax ;  it  thanked  God  for  the  very 
sins  of  others,  and  thought  that  He  could  be  pleased  with  a  service  in 
which  there  was  neither  humility,  nor  truthfulness,  nor  loyalty,  nor 
love.  Those  poor  formalists,  who  thought  that  they  were  so  rich  and 
increased  with  goods,  had  to  learn  that  they  were  wretched,  and  poor, 
and  miserable,  and  blind,  and  naked.  These  sheep,  which  fancied  that 
they  had  not  strayed,  had  to  understand  that  the  poor  lost  sheep  might 
be  carried  home  on  the  shoulders  of  the  Good  Shepherd  with  a  yet 
deeper  tenderness;  these  elder  sons  had  to  learn  that  their  Father's 
spirit,  however  little  they  might  be  able  to  realise  it  in  their  frozen 
unsympathetic  hearts,  was  this :  "It  was  meet  that  we  should  make 
merry  and  be  glad,  for  this  thy  brother  was  dead  and  is  alive  again, 
was  lost  and  is  found." 

5.  But  however  much  it  might  be  manifest  that  the  spirit  of 
the  Christ  and  the  spirit  of  the  Pharisee  were  inalienably  opposed  to 
each  other,  yet  up  to  this  point  the  enemies  of  Jesus  were  unable  to 
ruin  His  influence  or  check  His  work.  To  forgive,  with  the  same 
word  which  healed  the  diseases,  the  sins  by  which  they  believed  all 
diseases  to  be  caused — to  join  in  social  festivities — to  associate  with 
publicans  and  sinners — were  not,  and  could  not  be  construed  into, 
offences  against  the  law.  But  a  weightier  charge,  more  persistently 
reiterated,  more  violently  resented,  remained  behind — a  charge  of 
distinctly  violating  the  express  laws  of  Moses  by  non-observance  of 
the  Sabbath.  This  it  was  which  caused  a  surprise,  an  exacerbation,  a 
madness,  a  thirst  for  sanguinary  vengeance,  which  pursued  Him  to  the 
very  cross.  For  the  Sabbath  was  a  Mosaic,  nay,  even  a  primeval 
institution,  and  it  had  become  the  most  distinctive  and  the  most 
passionately  reverenced  of  all  the  ordinances  which  separated  the 
Jew  from  the  Gentile  as  a  peculiar  people.  It  was  at  once  the  sign 
of  their  exclusive  privileges,  and  the  centre  of  their  barren  formalism. 
Their  traditions,  their  patriotism,  even  their  obstinacy,  were  all 
enlisted  in  its  scrupulous  maintenance.  Not  only  had  it  been  observed 
iu  heaven  before  man  was,  but  they  declared  that  the  people  of  Israel 
had  been  chosen  for  the  sole  purpose  of  keeping  it.  Was  it  not  even 
miraculously  kept  by  the  Sabbatical  river  of  the  Holy  City  ?  Their 
devotion  to  it  was  only  deepened  by  the  universal  ridicule,  incon- 
venience, and  loss  which  it  entailed  upon  them  in  the  heathen  world. 
They  were  even  proud  that,  from  having  observed  it  with  a  stolid 
literalism,  they  had  suffered  themselves  On  that  day  to  lose  battles,  to 


20 1  THE    LIFE    OF   CHK1ST. 

be  cut  to  pieces  by  their  enemies,  to  see  Jerusalem  itself  imperilled 
and  captured.  Its  observance  had  been  fenced  round  by  the  minutest, 
the  most  painfully  precise,  the  most  ludicrously  insignificant  restric- 
tions. The  Prophet  had  called  it  "  a  delight,"  and  therefore  it  was  a 
duty  even  for  the  poor  to  eat  three  times  on  that  day.  They  were  to 
feast  on  it,  though  no  fire  was  to  be  lighted  and  no  food  cooked. 
According  to  the  stiff  and  narrow  school  of  Shammai,  no  one  on  the 
Sabbath  might  even  comfort  the  sick  or  enliven  the  sorrowful.  Even 
the  preservation  of  life  was  a  breaking  of  the  Sabbath ;  and,  on  the 
other  hand,  even  to  kill  a  flea  was  as  bad  as  to  kill  a  camel.  Had 
not  the  command  to  "  do  no  manner  of  work  upon  the  Sabbath  day  " 
been  most  absolute  and  most  emphatic  ?  had  not  M»ses  himself  and  all 
the  congregation  caused  the  son  of  Shelomith  to  be  stoned  to  death  for 
merely  gathering  sticks  upon  it  ?  had  not  the  Great  Synagogue  itself 
drawn  up  the  thirty-nine  abliotli  and  quite  innumerable  toldoth,  or 
prohibitions  of  labours  which  violated  it  in  the  first  or  in  the  second 
degree  ?  Yet  here  was  One,  claiming  to  be  a  prophet,  yea,  and  more 
than  a  prophet,  deliberately  setting  aside,  as  it  seemed  to  them,  the 
traditional  sanctity  of  that  day  of  days !  Even  an  attentive  reader  of 
the  Gospels  will  be  surprised  to  find  how  large  a  portion  of  the  enmity 
and  opposition  which  our  Lord  excited,  not  only  in  Jerusalem,  but  even 
in  Galilee  and  in  Peraea,  turned  upon  this  point  alone. 

The  earliest  outbreak  of  the  feeling  in  Galilee  must  have  occurred 
shortly  after  the  events  narrated  in  the  last  chapter.  The  feeding  of 
the  five  thousand,  and  the  discourse  in  the  synagogue  of  Capernaum, 
took  place  immediately  before  a  Passover.  None  of  the  Evangelists 
narrate  the  events  which  immediately  succeeded.  If  Jesus  attended 
this  Passover,  He  must  have  done  so  in  strict  privacy  and  seclusion, 
and  no  single  incident  of  His  visit  has  been  recorded.  It  is  more 
probable  that  the  peril  and  opposition  which  He  had  undergone  in 
Jerusalem  were  sufficient  to  determine  His  absence  "until  this  tyranny 
was  overpast."  It  is  not,  however,  impossible  that,  if  He  did  not  go 
in  person,  some  at  least  of  His  disciples  fulfilled  this  national  obliga- 
tion ;  and  it  may  have  been  an  observation  of  their  behaviour,  com- 
bined with  the  deep  hatred  inspired  by  His  bidding  the  healed  man 
take  up  his  bed  on  the  Sabbath  day,  and  by  the  ground  which  He  had 
taken  in  defending  Himself  against  that  charge,  which  induced  the 
Scribes  and  Pharisees  of  Jerusalem  to  send  some  of  their  number  to 
follow  His  steps,  and  to  keep  an  espionage  upon  His  actions,  even  by 
the  shores  of  His  own  beloved  lake.  Certain  it  is  that  henceforth,  afc 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  205 

every  turn  and  every  period  of  His  career — in  the  corn-fields,  in 
synagogues,  in  feasts,  during  journeys,  at  Capernaum,  at  Magdala,  in 
Pereea,  at  Bethany — we  find  Him  dogged,  watched,  impeded,  reproached, 
questioned,  tempted,  insulted,  conspired  against  by  these  representa- 
tives of  the  leading  authorities  of  His  nation,  of  whom  we  are 
repeatedly  told  that  they  were  not  natives  of  the  place,  but  "  certain 
which  came  from  Jerusalem." 

i.  The  first  attack  in  Galilee  arose  from  the  circumstance  that,  in 
passing  through  the  corn-fields  on  the  Sabbath  day,  His  disciples,  who 
were  suffering  from  hunger,  plucked  the  ears  of  corn,  rubbed  them  in 
the  palms  of  their  hands,  blew  away  the  chaff,  and  ate.  Undoubtedly 
this  was  a  very  high  offence — even  a  capital  offence — in  the  eyes  of  the 
Legalists.  To  reap  and  to  thresh  on  the  Sabbath  were  of  course  for- 
bidden by  one  of  the  abhoth,  or  primary  rules ;  but  the  Rabbis  had 
decided  that  to  pluck  corn  was  to  bs  construed  as  reaping,  and  to  rub 
it  as  threshing ;  even  to  walk  on  grass  was  forbidden,  because  that  too 
was  a  species  of  threshing ;  and  not  so  much  as  a  fruit  must  be  plucked 
from  a  tree.  All  these  latter  acts  were  violations  of  the  toldoth,  or 
"derivative  rules."  Perhaps  these  spying  Pharisees  had  followed 
Jesus  on  this  Sabbath  day  to  watch  whether  He  would  go  more  than 
the  prescribed  techum  ha-Shabbeth,  or  Sabbath-day's  journey  of  two 
thousand  cubits;  but  here  they  had  been  fortunate  enough  to  light 
upon  a  far  more  heinous  and  flagrant  scandal — an  act  of  the  disciples 
which,  strictly  and  technically  speaking,  rendered  them  liable  to  death 
by  stoning.  Jesus  Himself  had  not  indeed  shared  in  the  offence.  If 
we  may  press  the  somewhat  peculiar  expression  of  St.  Mark,  He  was 
walking  along  through  the  corn-fields  by  the  ordinary  path,  bearing 
His  hunger  as  best  He  might,  while  the  disciples  were  pushing  for 
themselves  a  road  through  the  standing  corn  by  plucking  the  ears  as 
they  went  along.  Now  there  was  no  harm,  whatever  in  plucking  the 
ears ;  that  was  not  only  sanctioned  by  custom,  but  even  distinctly  per- 
mitted by  the  Mosaic  law.  But  the  heinous  fact  was  that  this  should 
be  done  on  a,  Sabbath !  Instantly  the  Pharisees  are  round  our  Lord, 
pointing  to  the  disciples  with  the  angry  question,  "  See  !  why  do  they  " 
— with  a  contemptuous  gesture  towards  the  disciples — "  do  that  which 
is  not  lawful  on  the  Sabbath  day  ?  " 

With  that  divine  and  instantaneous  readiness,  with  that  depth  of 
insight  and  width  of  knowledge  which  characterized  His  answers  to 
the  most  sudden  surprises,  Jesus  instantly  protected  His  disciples 
with  personal  approval  and  decisive  support.  As  the  charge  this  time 


20G  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

was  aimed  not  at  Himself  but  at  His  disciples,  His  line  of  argument 
and  defence  differs  entirely  from,  that  "which,  as  we  have  seen,  He  had 
adopted  at  Jerusalem.  There  He  rested  His  supposed  violation  of  the 
law  on  His  personal  authority ;  here,  while  He  again  declared  Himself 
Lord  of  the  Sabbath,  He  instantly  quoted  first  from  their  own 
Cethubhim,  then  from  their  own  Law,  a  precedent  and  a  principle 
which  absolved  His  followers  from  all  blame.  "  Have  ye  not  read," 
He  asked,  adopting  perhaps  with  a  certain  delicate  irony,  as  He  did 
at  other  times,  a  favourite  formula  of  their  own  Rabbis,  "  how  David 
not  only  went  with  his  armed  followers  into  the  Temple  on  the 
Sabbath  day,  but  actually  ate  with  them  the  sanctified  shewbread, 
which  it  was  expressly  forbidden  for  any  but  the  priests  to  eat  ?  " 
If  David,  their  hero,  their  favourite,  their  saint,  had  thus  openly  and 
flagrantly  violated  the  letter  of  the  law,  and  had  yet  been  blameless 
on  the  sole  plea  of  a  necessity  higher  than  any  merely  ceremonial 
injunction,  why  were  the  disciples  to  blame  for  the  harmless  act  of 
sating  their  hunger?  And  again,  if  their  own  Rabbis  had  laid  it 
down  that  there  was  "  no  Sabbatism  in  the  Temple  ;  "  that  the  priests 
on  the  Sabbath  might  hew  the  wood,  and  light  the  fires,  and  place  hot 
fresh-baked  shewbread  on  the  table,  and  slay  double  victims,  and 
circumcise  children,  and  thus  in  every  way  violate  the  rules  of  the 
Sopherim  about  the  Sabbath,  and  yet  be  blameless — nay,  if  in  acting 
thus  they  were  breaking  the  Sabbath  •  at  the  bidding  of  the  very  Law 
which  ordains  the  Sabbath — then  if  the  Temple  excuses  them,  ought 
not  something  greater  than  the  Temple  to  excuse  these  ?  And  there 
was  something  greater  than  the  Temple  here.  And  then  once  more 
He  reminds  them  that  mercy  is  better  than  sacrifice.  Now  the 
Sabbath  was  expressly  designed  for  mercy,  and  therefore  not  only 
might  all  acts  of  mercy  be  blamelessly  performed  thereon,  but  such 
acts  would  be  more  pleasing  to  God  than  all  the  insensate  and  self- 
satisfied  scrupulosities  which  had  turned  a  rich  blessing  into  a  burden 
and  a  snare.  The  Sabbath  was  made  for  man,  not  man  for  the 
Sabbath,  and  therefore  the  Son  of  Man  is  Lord  also  of  the  Sabbath. 

In  the  Codex  Bezac,  an  ancient  and  valuable  manuscript  now  in 
the  University  Library  at  Cambridge,  there  occurs  after  Luke  vi.  5 
this  remarkable  addition — "  On  the  same  day,  seeing  one  working  on 
the  Sabbath,  He  said  to  him,  0  man,  if  indeed  thou  knowest  what 
thou  doest,  thou  curt  blessed;  but  if  thou  knowest  not,  thou  art  accused, 
and  a  transgressor  of  Hie  law."  The  incident  is  curious ;  it  is  preserved 
for  us  in  this  manuscript  alone,  and  it  may  perhaps  be  set  aside  as 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  207 


apocryphal,  or  at  best  as  one  of  those  aypa<j>a  SoyftaTa,  or  "unrecorded 
sayings"  which,  like  Acts  xx.  35,  are  attributed  to  our  Lord  by 
tradition  only.  Yet  the  story  is  too  striking,  too  intrinsically  probable, 
to  be  at  once  rejected  as  onauthentic.  Nothing  could  more  clearly 
illustrate  the  spirit  of  our  Lord's  teaching,  as  it  was  understood,  for 
instance,  by  St.  Paul.  For  the  meaning  of  the  story  obviously  is  — 
If  thy  work  is  of  faith,  then  thou  art  acting  rightly  :  if  it  is  not  of 
faith,  it  is  sin. 

ii.  It  was  apparently  on  the  day  signalised  by  this  bitter  attack, 
that  our  Lord  again,  later  in  the  afternoon,  entered  the  synagogue.  A 
man  —  tradition  says  that  he  was  a  stonemason,  maimed  by  an  accident, 
who  had  prayed  Christ  to  heal  him,  that  he  might  not  be  forced  to 
beg  —  was  sitting  in  the  synagogue.  His  presence,  and  apparently  the 
purpose  of  His  presence,  was  known  to  all  ;  and  in  the  chief  seats  were 
Scribes,  Pharisees,  and  Herodians,  whose  jealous,  malignant  gaze  was 
fixed  on  Christ  to  see  what  He  would  do,  that  they  might  accuse  Him. 
He  did  not  leave  them  long  in  doubt.  First  He  bade  the  man  with 
the  withered  hand  get  up  and  stand  out  in  the  midst.  And  then  He 
referred  to  the  adjudication  of  their  own  consciences  the  question  that 
was  in  their  hearts,  formulating  it  only  in  such  a  way  as  to  show  them 
its  real  significance.  "  Is  it  lawful,"  He  asked,  "  on  the  Sabbath  days 
to  do  good  or  to  do  evil  ?  to  save  life  (as  I  am  doing),  or  to  kill  (as 
you  in  your  hearts  are  wishing  to  do)  ?"  There  could  be  but  one 
answer  to  such  a  question,  but  they  were  not  there  either  to  search  for 
or  to  tell  the  truth.  Their  sole  object  was  to  watch  what  He  would 
do,  and  found  upon  it  a  public  charge  before  the  Sanhedrin,  or  if  not, 
at  least  to  brand  Him  thenceforth  with  the  open  stigma  of  a  Sabbath- 
breaker.  Therefore  they  met  the  question  by  stolid  and  impotent 
silence.  But  He  would  not  allow  them  to  escape  the  verdict  of  their 
own  better  judgment,  and  therefore  He  justified  Himself  by  their  own 
distinct  practice,  no  less  than  by  their  inability  to  answer.  "  Is  there 
one  of  you,"  He  asked,  "who,  if  but  a  single  sheep  be  fallen  into  a 
•svater-pit,  will  not  get  hold  of  it,  and  pull  it  out  ?  How  much  then 
is  a  man  better  than  a  sheep  ?  "  The  argument  was  unanswerable,  and 
their  own  conduct  in  the  matter  was  undeniable;  but  still  their 
fierce  silence  remained  unbroken.  He  looked  round  on  them  with 
anger  ;  a  holy  indignation  burned  in  His  heart,  glowed  on  His  counte- 
nance, animated  His  gesture,  rang  in  His  voice,  as  slowly  he  swept 
each  hard  upturned  face  with  the  glance  that  upbraided  them  for  their 
malignity  and  meanness,  for  their  ignorance  and  pride;  and  then 


208  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

suppressing  that  bitter  and  strong  emotion  as  He  turned  to  do  Hia 
deed  of  mercy,  He  said  to  the  man,  "  Stretch  forth  thy  hand."  Was 
not  the  hand  withered  ?  How  could  he  stretch  it  forth  ?  The  word 
of  Christ  supplied  the  power  to  fulfil  His  command :  he  stretched  it 
out,  and  it  was  restored  whole  as  the  other. 

Thus  in  every  way  were  His  enemies  foiled — foiled  in  argument, 
shamed  into  silence,  thwarted  even  in  their  attempt  to  find  some 
ground  for  a  criminal  accusation.  For  even  in  healing  the  man, 
Christ  had  done  absolutely  nothing  which  their  worst  hostility  could 
misconstrue  into  a  breach  of  the  Sabbath  law.  He  had  not  touched 
the  man ;  He  had  not  questioned  him ;  He  had  not  bid  him  exercise 
his  recovered  power;  He  had  but  spoken  a  word,  and  not  even  a 
Pharisee  could  say  that  to  speak  a  word  was  an  infraction  of  the 
Sabbath,  even  if  the  word  were  followed  by  miraculous  blessing ! 
They  must  have  felt  how  utterly  they  were  defeated,  but  it  only 
kindled  their  rage  the  more.  They  were  filled  with  madness,  and 
communed  one  with  another  what  they  might  do  to  Jesus.  Hitherto 
they  had  been  enemies  of  the  Herodians.  They  regarded  them  as 
half-apostate  Jews,  who  accepted  the  Roman  domination,  imitated 
heathen  practices,  adopted  Sadducean  opinions,  and  had  gone  so  far 
in  their  flattery  to  the  reigning  house  that  they  had  blasphemously 
tried  to  represent  Herod  the  Great  as  the  promised  Messiah.  But 
now  their  old  enmities  were  reconciled  in  their  mad  rage  against 
a  common  foe.  Something — perhaps  the  fear  of  Antipas,  perhaps 
political  suspicion,  perhaps  the  mere  natural  hatred  of  worldlings  and 
renegades  against  the  sweet  and  noble  doctrines  which  shamed  their 
lives — had  recently  added  these  Herodians  to  the  number  of  the 
Saviour's  persecutors.  As  Galilee  was  the  chief  centre  of  Christ's 
activity,  the  Jeusalem  Pharisees  were  glad  to  avail  themselves  of  any 
aid  from  the  Galiloean  tetrarch  and  his  followers.  They  took  common 
council  how  they  might  destroy  by  violence  the  Prophet  whom  they 
could  neither  refute  by  reasoning  nor  circumvent  by  law. 

This  enmity  of  the  leaders  had  not  yet  estranged  from  Christ  tho 
minds  of  the  multitude.  Ib  made  it  desirable,  however,  for  Him  to 
move  to  another  place,  because  He  would  "neither  strive  nor  cry, 
neither  should  any  man  hear  His  voice  in  the  street,"  and  the  hour 
was  not  yet  como  when  He  should  "  send  forth  judgment  to  victory." 
Bat  before  His  departure  there  occurred  scenes  yet  more  violent,  and 
outbreaks  of  fury  against  Him  yet  more  marked  and  dangerous. 
Every  day  it  became  more  and  more  necessary  to  show  that  the  rift 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  209 

between  Him8elf  and  the  religions  leaders  of  His  nation  was  deep  and 
final ;  every  day  it  became  more  and  more  necessary  to  expose  the 
hypocritical  formalism  which  pervaded  their  doctrines,  and  which  was 
but  the  efflorescence  of  a  fatal  and  deeply-seated  plague. 

6.  His  first  distinct  denunciation  of  the  principles  that  lay  at  the 
very  basis  of  the  Pharisaic  system  was  caused  by  another  combined 
attempt  of  the  Jerusalem  Scribes  to  damage  the  position  of  His 
disciples.  On  some  occasion  they  had  observed  that  the  disciples  had 
sat  down  to  a  meal  without  previous  ablutions.  Now  these  ablutions 
were  insisted  upon  with  special  solemnity  by  the  Oral  Tradition.  The 
Jews  of  later  times  related  with  intense  admiration  how  the  Rabbi 
Akiba,  when  imprisoned  and  furnished  with  only  sufficient  water  to 
maintain  life,  preferred  to  die  of  starvation  rather  than  eat  without 
the  proper  washings.  The  Pharisees,  therefore,  coming  up  to  Jesus  as 
usual  in  a  body,  ask  Him,  with  a  swelling  sense  of  self-importance  at 
the  justice  of  their  reproach,  "  "Why  do  thy  disciples  transgress  the 
tradition  of  the  elders  ?  for  they  wash  not  their  hands  when  they  eat 
bread." 

Before  giving  our  Lord's  reply,  St.  Mark  pauses  to  tell  us  that  the 
traditional  ablutions  observed  by  the  Pharisees  and  all  the  leading 
Jews  were  extremely  elaborate  and  numerous.  Before  every  meal, 
and  at  every  return  from  market,  they  washed  "  with  the  first,"  and  if 
no  water  was  at  hand  a  man  was  obliged  to  go  at  least  four  miles  to 
search  for  it.  Besides  this  there  were  precise  rules  for  the  washing  of 
all  cups  and  sextdrii  and  banquet-couches  (triclinia)  and  brazen  vessels. 
The  treatise  Shiilchan-Aruk,  or  "  Table  arranged,"  a  compendium  of 
Rabbinical  usages  drawn  up  by  Josef  Karo  in  1567,  contains  no  less 
than  twenty-six  prayers  by  which  these  washings  were  accompanied. 
To  neglect  them  was  as  bad  as  homicide,  and  involved  a  forfeiture 
of  eternal  life.  And  yet  the  disciples  dared  to  eat  with  "  common  " 
(that  is,  with  unwashen)  hands  ! 

As  usual,  our  Lord  at  once  made  common  cause  with  His  disciples, 
and  did  not  leave  them,  in  their  simplicity  and  ignorance,  to  be 
overawed  by  the  attack  of  these  stately  and  sanctimonious  critics.  He 
answered  their  question  by  a  far  graver  one.  "  Why,"  He  said,  "  do- 
you  too  violate  the  commandment  of  God  by  this  '  tradition  '  of  yours  ? 
For  God's  command  was  '  Honour  thy  father  and  thy  mother ;'  but 
your  gloss  is,  instead  of  giving  to  father  and  mother,  a  man  may  simply 
give  the  sum  intended  for  their  support  to  the  sacred  treasury,  and 
say,  '  It  is  Corban,'  and  then — he  is  exempt  from  any  further  burden 


210  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

in.  their  support !  And  many  such  things  ye  do.  Ye  hypocrites ! " 
— it  was  the  first  time  that  our  Lord  had  thus  sternly  rebuked  them — 
"  finely  do  ye  abolish  and  obliterate  the  commandment  of  God  by  your 
traditiotis ;  and  well  did  Isaiah  prophesy  of  you,  '  This  people  honoureth 
me  with  their  lips,  but  their  heart  is  far  from  me ;  but  in  vain  do  they 
worship  me,  teaching  for  doctrines  the  commandment  of  men.'" 

This  was  not  only  a  defence  of  the  disciples — because  it  showed 
that  they  merely  neglected  a  body  of  regulations  which  were  in  them- 
selves so  opposed  to  the  very  letter  of  the  sacred  law  as,  in  many  cases, 
to  be  more  honoured  in  the  breach  than  the  observance — but  it  was  the 
open  rebuke  of  One  who  assumed  a  superior  and  fearless  authority, 
and  a  distinct  reprobation  of  a  system  which  guided  all  the  actions  of 
the  Rabbinic  caste,  and  was  more  reverenced  than  the  Pentateuch 
itself.  The  quintessence  of  that  system  was  to  sacrifice  the  spirit  to 
the  letter,  which,  apart  from  that  spirit,  was  more  than  valueless  ;  and 
to  sacrifice  the  letter  itself  to  mere  inferences  from  it  which  were 
absolutely  pernicious.  The  Jews  distinguished  between  the  written 
Law  (Torah  Sliebeketeli)  and  the  traditional  Law,  or  "  Law  upon  the 
lip "  (Torah  Shebeal  piJi) ;  and  the  latter  was  asserted,  by  its 
more  extravagant  votaries,  to  have  been  orally  delivered  by  God 
to  Moses,  and  orally  transmitted  by  him  through  a  succession  of 
elders.  On  it  is  founded  the  Talmud  (or  "  doctrine  "),  which  consists 
of  the  Mishna  (or  "  repetition  ")  of  the  Law,  and  the  Gremara,  or  "  sup- 
plement" to  it;  and  so  extravagant  did  the  reverence  for  the  Talmud 
become,  that  it  was  said  to  be,  in  relation  to  the  Law,  as  wine  to 
water ;  to  read  the  Scriptures  was  a  matter  of  indifference,  but  to  read 
the  Mishna  was  meritorious,  and  to  read  the  Gremara  would  be  to 
receive  the  richest  recompense.  And  it  was  this  grandiose  system  of 
revered  commentary  and  pious  custom  which  Jesus  now  so  completely 
discountenanced,  as  not  only  to  defend  the  neglect  of  it,  but  even 
openly  to  condemn  and  repudiate  its  most  established  principles.  He 
thus  consigned  to  oblivion  and  indifference  the  entire  paraphernalia 
of  JIagadotli  ("legends")  and  Halachoth  ("rules"),  which,  though 
up  to  that  period  it  had  not  been  committed  to  writing,  was  yet 
devoutly  cherished  in  the  memory  of  the  learned,  and  constituted  the 
very  treasury  of  Rabbinic  wisdom. 

Nor  was  this  all :  not  content  with  shattering  the  very  bases  of 
their  external  religion,  He  even  taught  to  the  multitude  doctrines 
which  would  undermine  their  entire  authority — doctrines  which  would 
tend  to  bring  their  vaunted  wisdom  into  utter  discredit.  The  supre- 


TUB    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  211 

macy  of  His  disapproval  was  in  exact  proportion  to  the  boundlessness 
of  their  own  arrogant  self-assertion ;  and  turning  away  from,  them  as 
though  they  were  hopeless,  He  summoned  the  multitude,  whom  they 
had  trained  to  look  up  to  them  as  little  gods,  and  spoke  these  short 
and  weighty  words  : 

"Hear  me,  all  of  you,  and  understand!  N"ot  that  which  goeth 
into  the  mouth  defileth  the  man ;  but  that  which  cometh  out  of  the 
mouth,  that  defileth  a  man." 

The  Pharisees  were  bitterly  offended  by  this  saying,  as  well  indeed 
they  might  be.  Condemnatory  as  it  was  of  the  too  common  sacerdotal 
infatuation  for  all  that  is  merely  ceremonial,  that  utterance  of  Jesus 
should  have  been  the  final  death-knell  of  that  superfluity  of  voluntary 
ceremonialism  for  which  one  of  the  Fathers  coins  the  inimitable  word 
€0£\07repicro'o6pr]<TK€ia.  His  disciples  were  not  slow  to  inform  Him. 
of  the  indignation  which  His  words  had  caused,  for  they  probably 
retained  a  large  share  of  the  popular  awe  for  the  leading  sect.  But 
the  reply  of  Jesus  was  an  expression  of  calm  indifference  to  earthly 
judgment,  a  reference  of  all  worth  to  the  sole  judgment  of  God  as 
shown  in  the  slow  ripening  of  events.  "  Every  plant  which  my 
Heavenly  Father  hath  not  planted  shall  be  rooted  up.  Let  them 
alone.  They  be  blind  leaders  of  the  blind ;  and  if  the  blind  lead  the 
blind,  shall  they  not  both  fall  into  the  ditch  ?  " 

A  little  later,  when  they  were  in-doors  and  alone,  Peter  ventured 
to  ask  for  an  explanation  of  the  words  which  He  had  uttered  so 
emphatically  to  the  multitude.  Jesus  gently  blamed  the  want  of  com- 
prehension among  His  Apostles,  but  showed  them,  in  teaching  of  deep 
significance,  that  man's  food  does  but  affect  his  material  structure,  and 
does  not  enter  into  his  heart,  or  touch  his  real  being;  but  that  "from 
within,  out  of  the  heart  of  men,  proceed  evil  thoughts,  adulteries,  forni- 
cations, murders,  theft,  covetousness,  wickedness,  deceit,  lasciviousness, 
an  evil  eye,  blasphemy,  pride,  foolishness." 

Evil  thoughts — like  one  tiny  rill  of  evil,  and  then  the  burst  of  all 
that  black  overwhelming  torrent ! 

"  These  are  the  things  which  defile  a  man ;  but  to  eat  with  un- 
washen  hands  defileth  not  a  man." 


212  THE   LIFE   OF   CliKIST. 

CHAPTER  XXXn. 

DEEPENING      OPPOSITION. 

THERE  was  to  be  one  more  day  of  opposition — more  bitter,  more  dan- 
gerous, more  personal,  more  implacable — one  day  of  open  and  final 
rupture  between  Jesus  and  the  Pharisaic  spies  from  Jerusalem — before 
He  yielded  for  a  time  to  the  deadly  hatred  of  His  enemies,  and  retired 
to  find  in  heathen  countries  the  rest  which  He  could  find  no  longer  in 
the  rich  fields  and  on  the  green  hills  of  Gennesareth.  There  were  but 
few  days  of  His  earthly  life  which  passed  through  a  series  of  more 
heart-shaking  agitations  than  the  one  which  we  shall  now  describe. 

Jesus  was  engaged  in  solitary  prayer,  probably  at  early  dawn,  and 
in  one  of  the  towns  which  formed  the  chief  theatre  of  His  Galileean 
ministry.  While  they  saw  Him  standing  there  with  His  eyes  uplifted 
to  heaven — for  standing,  not  kneeling,  was  and  is  the  common  Oriental 
attitude  in  prayer — the  disciples  remianed  at  a  reverent  distance ;  but 
when  His  orisons  were  over,  they  came  to  Him  with  the  natural 
entreaty  that  He  would  teach  them  to  pray,  as  John  also  taught  his 
disciples.  He  at  once  granted  their  request,  and  taught  them  that 
short  and  perfect  petition  which  has  thenceforth  been  the  choicest 
heritage  of  every  Christian  liturgy,  and  the  model  on  which  all  our 
best  and  most  acceptable  prayers  are  formed.  He  had,  indeed,  already 
used  it  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  but  we  may  be  deeply  thankful 
that  for  the  sake  of  His  asking  disciples  He  here  brought  it  into  greater 
and  more  separate  prominence.  Some,  indeed,  of  the  separate  clauses 
may  already  have  existed,  at  least  in  germ,  among  the  Jewish  forms  of 
prayer,  since  they  resemble  expressions  which  are  found  in  the  Talmud, 
and  which  we  have  no  reason  to  suppose  were  borrowed  from  Christians. 
Bat  never  before  had  all  that  was  best  and  purest  in  a  nation's  prayers 
been  thus  collected  into  one  noble  and  incomparable  petition — a  petition 
which  combines  all  that  the  heart  of  man,  taught  by  the  Spirit  of  God, 
had  found  most  needful  for  the  satisfaction  of  its  truest  aspirations. 
In  the  mingled  love  and  reverence  with  which  it  teaches  us  to  approach 
our  Father  in  heaven — in  the  spirituality  with  which  it  leads  us  to  seek 
first  the  kingdom  of  God  and  His  righteousness — in  the  spirit  of 
universal  charity  and  forgiveness  which  it  inculcates — in  that  plural 
form  throughout  it,  which  is  meant  to  show  us  that  selfishness  must 
be  absolutely  and  for  ever  excluded  from  our  petitions,  and  that  no 


THE    LIFE    OF   CUEIST.  213 

man  can  come  to  God  as  his  Father  without  acknowledging  that  his 
worst  enemies  are  also  God's  children — in  the  fact  that  of  its  seven 
petitions  one,  and  one  only,  is  for  any  earthly  blessing,  and  even 
that  one  is  only  for  earthly  blessings  in  their  simplest  form — in  the 
manner  in  which  it  discountenances  all  the  vain  repetitions  and 
extravagant  self-tortures  with  which  so  many  fanatic  worshippers 
have  believed  that  God  could  be  propitiated — even  in  that  exquisite 
brevity  which  shows  us  how  little  God  desires  that  prayer  should 
be  made  a  burden  and  weariness — it  is,  indeed,  what  the  Fathers  have 
called  it,  a  breviarium  Evangelii — the  pearl  of  prayers. 

Not  less  divine  were  the  earnest  and  simple  words  which  followed 
it,  and  which  taught  the  disciples  that  men  ought  always  to  pray  and 
not  to  faint,  since,  if  importunity  prevails  over  the  selfishness  of  man, 
earnestness  must  be  all-powerful  with  the  righteousness  of  God. 
Jesus  impressed  upon  them  the  lesson  that  if  human  affection  can  be 
trusted  to  give  only  useful  and  kindly  gifts,  the  love  of  the  Great 
Father,  who  loves  us  all,  will,  much  more  certainly,  give  His  best 
and  highest  gift — even  the  gift  of  the  Holy  Spirit — to  all  that  ask 
Him. 

And  with  what  exquisite  yet  vivid  graciousness  are  these  great 
lessons  inculcated  !  Had  they  been  delivered  in  the  dull,  dry,  didactic 
style  of  most  moral  teaching,  how  could  they  have  touched  the  hearts, 
or  warmed  the  imaginations,  or  fixed  themselves  indelibly  upon  the 
memories  of  those  who  heard  them  ?  But  instead  of  being  clothed  in 
scholastic  pedantisms,  they  were  conveyed  in  a  little  tale  founded  on 
the  most  commonplace  incidents  of  daily  life,  and  of  a  daily  life  full  of 
simplicity  and  poverty.  Journeying  at  night  to  avoid  the  burning 
heat,  a  man  arrives  afc  a  friend's  house.  The  host  is  poor,  and  has 
nothing  for  him;  yet,  because  even  at  that  late  hour  he  will  not 
neglect  the  duties  of  hospitality,  he  gets  up,  and  goes  to  the  house  of 
another  friend  to  borrow  three  loaves.  But  this  other  is  in  bed ;  his 
little  children  are  with  him ;  his  house  is  locked  and  barred.  To  the 
gentle  and  earnest  entreaty  he  answers  crossly  and  roughly  from 
within,  "  Trouble  me  not."  But  his  friend  knows  that  he  has  come  on 
a  good  errand,  and  he  persists  in  knocking,  till  at  last,  not  from  kind 
motives,  but  because  of  his  pertinacity,  the  man  gets  up  and  gives  him 
all  that  he  requires.  "  Even  so,"  it  has  been  beautifully  observed 
"  when  the  heart  which  has  been  away  on  a  journey,  suddenly  at  mid- 
night (i.e.,  the  time  of  greatest  darkness  and  distress)  returns  home  to 
us — that  is,  comes  to  itself  and  feels  hunger — and  we  have  nothing  j 


214  THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

wherewith  to  satisfy  it,  God  requires  of  us  bold,  importunate  faith." 
If  such  persistency  conquers  the  reluctance  of  ungracious  man,  how 
much  more  shall  it  prevail  with  One  who  loves  us  better  than  we  our- 
selves, and  who  is  even  more  ready  to  hear  than  we  to  pray ! 

It  has  been  well  observed  that  the  narrative  of  the  life  of  Christ  on 
earth  is  full  of  lights  and  shadows — one  brief  period,  or  even  one  day, 
starting  at  times  into  strong  relief,  while  at  other  times  whole  periods 
are  passed  over  in  unbroken  silence.  But  we  forget — and  if  we  bear 
this  in  mind,  there  will  be  nothing  to  startle  us  in  this  phenomenon  of 
the  Gospel  record — we  forget  how  large  and  how  necessary  a  portion 
of  His  work  it  was  to  teach  and  train  His  immediate  Apostles  for  the 
future  conversion  of  the  world.  When  we  compare  what  the  Apostles 
were  when  Jesus  called  them — simple  and  noble  indeed,  but  ignorant, 
and  timid,  and  slow  of  heart  to  believe — with  what  they  became  when 
He  had  departed  from  them,  and  shed  the  gift  of  His  Holy  Spirit  into 
their  hearts,  then  we  shall  see  how  little  intermission  there  could  have 
been  in  His  beneficent  activity,  even  during  the  periods  in  which  His 
discourses  were  delivered  to  those  only  who  lived  in  the  very  light  of 
His  divine  personality.  Blessed  indeed  were  they  above  kings  and 
prophets,  blessed  beyond  all  who  have  ever  lived  in  the  richness  of 
their  privilege,  since  they  could  share  His  inmost  thoughts,  and  watch 
in  all  its  angelic  sweetness  and  simplicity  the  daily  spectacle  of  those 
"sinless  years."  But  if  this  blessing  was  specially  accorded  to  them, 
it  was  not  for  their  own  sakes,  but  for  the  sake  of  that  world  which  it 
was  their  mission  to  elevate  from  despair  and  wickedness  into  purity 
and  sober-mindedness  and  truth — for  the  sake  of  those  holy  hearts 
who  were  henceforth  to  enjoy  a  Presence  nearer,  though  spiritual, 
than  if,  with  the  Apostles,  they  could  have  climbed  with  Him  the 
lonely  hills,  or  walked  beside  Him  as  He  paced  at  evening  beside  the 
limpid  lake. 

The  day  which  had  begun  with  that  lesson  of  loving  and  confiding 
prayer  was  not  destined  to  proceed  thus  calmly.  Few  days  of  His 
life  during  these  years  can  have  passed  without  His  being  brought 
into  distressing  contact  with  the  evidences  of  human  sin  and  human 
suffering ;  but  on  this  day  the  spectacle  was  brought  before  Him  in 
its  wildest  and  most  terrible  form.  A  man  blind  and  dumb  and  mad, 
from  those  strange  unaccountable  influences  which  the  universal  belief 
attributed  to  demoniac  possession,  was  brought  before  Him.  Jesus 
would  not  leave  him  a  helpless  victim  to  the  powers  of  evil.  By  His 
look  and  by  His  word  He  released  the  miserable  sufferer  from  tho 


THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  215 

horrible  oppression — calmed,  healed,  restored  him — "insomuch  that  the 
blind  and  dumb  both  spake  and  saw." 

It  appears  from  our  Lord's  own  subsequent  words  that  there 
existed  among  the  Jews  certain  forms  of  exorcism,  which  to  a  certain 
extent,  at  any  rate,  were  efficacious;  but  there  are  traces  that  the 
cures  so  effected  were  only  attempted  in  milder  and  simpler  cases. 
The  dissolution  of  so  hideous  a  spell  as  that  which  had  bound  this 
man — the  power  to  pour  light  on  the  filmed  eyeball,  and  to  restore 
speech  to  the  cramped  tongue,  and  intelligence  to  the  bewildered 
soul — was  something  that  the  people  had  never  witnessed.  The 
miracle  produced  a  thrill  of  astonishment,  a  burst  of  unconcealed 
admiration.  For  the  first  time  they  openly  debated  whether  He  who 
had  such  power  could  be  any  other  than  their  expected  Deliverer. 
"Can  this  man,"  they  incredulously  asked,  "can  he  be  the  son  of 
David  ?  " 

His  enemies  could  not  deny  that  a  great  miracle  had  been  per/ 
formed,  and  since  it  did  not  convert,  it  only  hardened  and  maddened 
them.  But  how  could  they  dissipate  the  deep  impression  which  it 
had  made  on  the  minds  of  the  amazed  spectators  ?  The  Scribes 
who  came  from  Jerusalem,  more  astute  and  ready  than  their  simple 
Galilasan  brethren,  at  once  invented  a  ready  device  for  this  purpose. 
"This  fellow  hath  Beelzebufc" — such  was  their  notable  and  insolent 
solution  of  the  difficulty,  "  and  it  is  only  by  the  prince  of  the  devils 
that  He  casteth  out  the  devils."  Strange  that  the  ready  answer  did 
not  spring  to  every  lip,  as  it  did  afterwards  to  the  lips  of  some  who 
heard  the  same  charge  brought  against  Him  in  Jerusalem,  "  These 
are  not  the  words  of  one  that  hath  a  devil."  But  the  people 
of  Galilee  were  credulous  and  ignorant ;  these  grave  and  reverend 
inquisitors  from  the  Holy  City  possessed  an  immense  and  hereditary 
ascendancy  over  their  simple  understandings,  and,  offended  as  they  had 
been  more  than  once  by  the  words  of  Jesus,  their  whole  minds  were 
bewildered  with  a  doubt.  The  awfulness  of  His  personal  ascendancy 
— the  felt  presence,  even  amid  His  tenderest  condescensions,  of  some- 
thing more  than  human — His  power  of  reading  the  thoughts — the 
ceaseless  and  sleepless  energy  of  His  beneficence — the  strange  terror 
which  He  inspired  in  the  poor  demoniacs — the  speech  which  some- 
times rose  into  impassioned  energy  of  denunciation,  and  sometimes,  by 
its  softness  and  beauty,  held  them  hushed  as  infants  at  the  mother's 
breast — the  revulsion  of  their  unbelieving  hearts  against  that  new 
world  of  fears  and  hopes  which  He  preached  to  them  as  the  kingdom 


216  TI1K   LIFE    OF   CHUIST. 

of  God — in  a  wqrd,  the  shuddering  sense  that  in  some  way  His  mere 
look  and  presence  placed  them  in  a  nearer  relation  than  they  had  ever 
been  before  with  the  Unseen  World — all  this,  as  it  had  not  prepared 
them  to  accept  the  trnth,  tended  from  the  first  to  leave  them  the  ready 
victims  of  insolent,  blasphemous,  and  authoritative  falsehood. 

And  therefore,  in  a  few  calm  words,  Jesus  shattered  the  hideous 
sophism  to  atoms.  He  showed  them  the  gross  absurdity  of  supposing 
that  Satan  could  be  his  own  enemy.  Using  an  irresistible  argumentum 
ad  hominem,  He  convicted  them  by  an  appeal  to  the  exorcisms  so 
freely,  but  almost  ineffectually,  professed  by  themselves  and  their 
pupils.  And  when  He  had  thus  showed  that  the  power  which  He 
exercised  must  be  at  once  superior  to  Satan  and  contrary  to  Satan, 
and  must  therefore  be  spiritual  and  divine,  He  warned  them  of  the 
awful  sinfulness  and  peril  of  this  their  blasphemy  against  the  Holy 
Spirit  of  God,  and  how  nearly  it  bordered  on  the  verge  of  that  sin 
which  alone,  of  all  sins,  could  neither  here  nor  hereafter  be  forgiven. 
And  then,  after  these  dim  and  mysterious  warnings,  speaking  to  them 
in  language  of  yet  plainer  significance,  He  turned  the  light  of  truth 
into  their  raging  and  hypocritical  hearts,  and  showed  them  how  this 
Dead  Sea  fruit  of  falsehood  and  calumny  could  only  spring  from  roots 
and  fibres  of  hidden  bitterness  ;  how  only  from  evil  treasures  hid  deep 
in  darkness,  where  the  very  source  of  light  was  quenched,  could  be  pro- 
duced these  dark  imaginings  of  their  serpentine  malignity.  Lastly, 
and  with  a  note  of  warning  which  has  never  since  ceased  to  vibrate, 
He  warned  them  that  the  u-ords  of  man  reveal  the  true  nature  of  the 
heart  within,  and  that  for  those,  as  for  all  other  false  and  lightly 
uttered  words  of  idle  wickedness,  they  should  give  account  at  the  last 
day.  The  weight  and  majesty  of  these  words — the  awful  solemnity  of 
the  admonition  which  they  conveyed — seem  for  a  time  to  have  reduced 
the  Pharisees  to  silence,  and  to  have  checked  tho  reiteration  of  their 
absurd  and  audacious  blasphemy.  And  in  the  hush  that  ensued  some 
woman  of  the  company,  in  an  uncontrollable  enthusiasm  of  admiration 
— accustomed  indeed  to  reverence  these  long-robed  Pharisees,  with 
their  fringes  and  phylacteries,  but  feeling  to  the  depth  of  her  heart  on 
how  lofty  a  height  above  them  the  Speaker  stood — exclaimed  to  Him 
in  a  loud  voice,  so  that  all  could  hear — 

"  Blessed  is  the  womb  that  bare  Thee,  and  the  breasts  that  Thou 
hast  sucked." 

"  Yea  " — or  as  we  may  render  it — "  Nay,  rather,"  He  answered, 
"  blessed  are  they  that  hear  the  Word  of  God,  and  keep  it." 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  217 

The  woman,  with  all  the  deep  and  passionate  affection  of  her  sex, 
had  cried,  How  blest  must  be  the  mother  of  such  a  Son  !  and  blessed 
indeed  that  mother  was,  and  blessed  was  the  fruit  of  her  womb — 
blessed  she  was  among  women,  and  blessed  because  she  believed :  yet 
hers  was  no  exclusive  blessedness ;  there  is  a  blessedness  yet  deeper 
and  loftier,  the  blessedness  of  obedience  to  the  Word  of  God.  "  How 
many  women,"  says  St.  Chrysostom,  "  have  blessed  that  Holy  Virgin, 
and  desired  to  be  such  a  mother  as  she  was !  What  hinders  them  ? 
Christ  has  made  for  us  a  wide  way  to  this  happiness,  and  not  only 
women,  but  men  may  tread  it — the  way  of  obedience ;  this  it  is  which 
makes  snch  a  mother,  not  the  throes  of  parturition." 

But  the  Pharisees,  though  baffled  for  a  moment,  did  not  intend  to 
leave  Jesus  long  in  peace.  He  had  spoken  to  them  in  language  of 
lofty  warning,  nay,  even  of  stern  rebuke — to  tJiem,  the  leaders  and 
religious  teachers  of  His  time  and  country.  What  gave  such  boldness 
to  one — a  mere  "  empty  cistern,"  a  mere  am  ha-arets — who  had  but 
just  emerged  from  the  obscure  and  ignorant  labours  of  a  provincial 
artisan  ?  how  did  He  dare  thus  to  address  them  ?  Let  Him  at  least 
show  them  some  sign — some  sign  from  heaven,  no  mere  exorcism  or 
act  of  healing,  but  some  great,  indisputable,  decisive  sign  of  His 
authority.  "  Master,  we  would  see  a  sign  from  Thee." 

It  was  the  old  question  which  had  assailed  Him  at  His  very  earliest 
ministry.  "  What  sign  showest  Thou  unto  us,  seeing  that  Thou  doest 
these  things  ?  " 

To  such  appeals,  made  only  to  insult  and  tempt — made  by  men 
who,  unconvinced  and  unsoftened,  had  just  seen  a  mighty  sign,  and 
had  attributed  it  at  once  without  a  blush  to  demoniac  agency — made, 
not  from  hearts  of  faith,  but  out  of  curiosity,  and  hatred,  and  unbelief 
— Jesus  always  turned  a  deaf  ear.  The  Divine  does  not  condescend 
to  limit  the  display  of  its  powers  by  the  conditions  of  finite  criticism, 
nor  is  it  conformable  to  the  council  of  God  to  effect  the  conversion  of 
human  souls  by  their  mere  astonishment  at  external  signs.  Had  Jesus 
given  them  a  sign  from  heaven,  is  it  likely  that  it  would  have  pro- 
dnced  any  effect  on  the  spiritual  children  of  ancestors  who,  according 
to  their  own  accepted  history,  in  the  very  sight,  nay,  under  the  very 
precipices  of  the  burning  hill,  had  sat  down  to  eat  and  to  drink,  and 
risen  up  to  play  ?  Would  it  have  had  any  permanent  significance  for 
the  moral  heirs  of  those  who  were  taunted  by  their  own  prophets  with 
having  taken  up  the  tabernacles  of  Moloch,  and  the  star  of  their  god 
Remphan,  though  they  were  guided  by  the  fiery  pillar,  and  quenched 


218  THE   LIFE    OF  CUEIST. 

their  thirst  from  the  smitten  rock  ?  Signs  they  had  seen  and  wonders 
in  abundance,  and  now  they  were  seeing  the  highest  sign  of  a  Sinless 
Life,  and  yet  they  did  but  rebel  and  blaspheme  the  more.  No  sign 
should  be  given,  then,  save  in  the  prophecies  which  they  could  not 
understand.  "  That  evil  and  adulterous  generation,"  He  exclaimed, 
turning  to  the  densely  crowded  multitude,  "  should  have  no  sign,  save 
the  sign  of  Jonah  the  prophet.  Saved  after  a  day  and  night  amid  the 
dark  and  tempestuous  sea,  he  had  been  a  sign  to  the  Ninevites ;  so  should 
the  Son  of  Man  be  saved  from  the  heart  of  the  earth.  And  those  men  of 
Nineveh,  who  repented  at  the  preaching  of  Jonah,  and  the  Queen  of 
Sheba,  who  came  from  the  ends  of  the  earth  to  hear  the  wisdom  of 
Solomon,  should  alike  rise  up  in  the  judgment  and  condemn  a  genera- 
tion that  despised  and  rejected  one  greater  than  Solomon  or  than 
Jonah.  For  that  generation  had  received  every  blessing:  by  the 
Babylonian  captivity,  by  the  Maccabffian  revival,  by  the  wise  and 
noble  rule  of  the  Asmonasan  princes,  recently  by  the  preaching  of 
John,  the  evil  spirit  of  idolatry  and  rebellion  which  distempered  their 
fathers  had  been  cast  out  of  them ;  its  old  abode  had  been  swept  and 
garnished  by  the  proprieties  of  Pharisees,  and  the  scrupulosities  of 
Scribes;  but,  alas!  no  good  spirit  had  been  invited  to  occupy  the 
empty  shrine,  and  now  the  old  unclean  possessor  had  returned  with 
seven  spirits  more  wicked  than  himself,  and  their  last  state  was  worse 
than  the  first." 

His  discourse  was  broken  at  this  point  by  a  sudden  interruption. 
News  had  again  reached  His  family  that  He  was  surrounded  by  a 
dense  throng,  and  was  speaking  words  more  strange  and  terrible  than 
ever  He  had  been  known  to  utter  ;  above  all,  that  He  had  repudiated 
with  open  scorn,  and  denounced  with  uncompromising  indignation, 
the  great  teachers  who  had  been  expressly  sent  from  Jerusalem  to 
watch  His  words.  Alarm  seized  them ;  perhaps  their  informant  had 
whispered  to  them  the  dread  calumny  which  had  thus  called  forth  His 
stern  rebukes.  From  the  little  which  we  can  learn  of  His  brethren, 
we  infer  that  they  were  Hebrews  of  the  Hebrews,  and  likely  to  be 
intensely  influenced  by  Rabbinical  and  sacerdotal  authority ;  as  yet, 
too,  they  either  did  not  believe  on  Him,  or  regarded  His  claims  in  a 
very  imperfect  light.  Is  not  the  time  again  come  for  them  to  inter- 
fere ?  can  they  not  save  Jesus,  on  whom  they  looked  as  their  Jesus, 
from  Himself  ?  can  they  not  exercise  over  Him  such  influence  as  shall 
save  Him  from  the  deadly  perils  to  which  His  present  teaching  would 
obviously  expose  Him  ?  can  they  not  use  towards  Him  such  gentle 


THE   LTFB   OP  CHRIST.  219 

control  as  should  hurry  Him  away  for  a  time  into  some  region  of 
secrecy  and  safety  ?  They  could  not,  indeed,  reach  Him  in  the  crowd, 
but  they  could  get  some  one  to  call  Hia  attention  to  their  presence. 
Suddenly  He  is  informed  by  one  of  His  audience — "  Behold,  Thy 
mother  and  Thy  brethren  stand  without,  desiring  to  speak  with  Thee." 
Alas  !  had  they  not  yet  learnt  that  if  they  would  not  enter,  their  sole 
right  place  was  to  stand  without  ?  that  His  hour  was  now  come  to 
pass  far  beyond  the  circle  of  mere  human  relationship,  infinitely  above 
the  control  of  human  brethren  ?  Must  their  bold  intrusive  spirit 
receive  one  more  check  ?  It  was  even  so ;  but  the  check  should  be 
given  gently,  and  so  as  to  be  an  infinite  comfort  to  others.  "  Who  is 
My  mother  ?  "  He  said  to  the  man  who  had  spoken,  "  and  who  are  My 
brethren  ?  "  And  then  stretching  forth  His  hand  towards  His  dis- 
ciples, He  said,  "  Behold  My  mother  and  My  brethren  !  For  whoso- 
ever shall  do  the  will  of  My  Father  which  is  in  heaven,  the  same  is 
My  brother,  and  sister,  and  mother  !  " 


CHAPTER    XXXIII. 

THE  DAY  OF  CONFLICT. 

UP  to  this  point  the  events  of  this  great  day  had  been  sufficiently 
agitating,  but  they  were  followed  by  circumstances  yet  more  painful 
and  exciting. 

The  time  for  the  mid-day  meal  had  arrived,  and  a  Pharisee  asked 
Him  to  come  and  lunch  at  his  house.  There  was  extremely  little 
hospitality  or  courtesy  in  the  invitation.  If  not  offered  in  downright 
hostility  and  bad  faith — as  we  know  was  the  case  with  similar 
Pharisaic  invitations — its  motive  at  the  best  was  but  curiosity  to  see 
more  of  the  new  Teacher,  or  a  vanity  which  prompted  him  to  patronise 
so  prominent  a  guest.  And  Jesus,  on  entering,  found  Himself,  not 
among  publicans  and  sinners,  where  He  could  soothe,  and  teach,  and 
bless — not  among  the  poor  to  whom  He  could  preach  the  kingdom  of 
heaven — not  among  friends  and  disciples  who  listened  with  deep  and 
loving  reverence  to  His  words — but  among  the  cold,  hard,  threatening 
faces,  the  sneers  and  frowns,  of  haughty  rivals  and  open  enemies. 


220  THE    LIFE    OF  .CHRIST. 

The  Apostles  do  not  seem  to  have  been  invited.  There  was  no 
sympathy  of  a  Thomas  to  sustain  Him,  no  gentleness  of  a  Nathanael 
to  encourage  Him,  no  ardour  of  a  Peter  to  defend,  no  beloved  John  to 
lean  his  head  upon  His  breast.  Scribe,  Lawyer,  and  Pharisee,  the 
guests  ostentatiously  performed  their  artistic  ablutions,  and  then — 
each  with  extreme  regard  for  his  own  precedence — swept  to  their 
places  at  the  board.  With  no  such  elaborate  and  fantastic  ceremonies, 
Jesus,  -as  soon  as  He  entered,  reclined  at  the  table.  It  was  a  short 
and  trivial  meal,  and  outside  thronged  the  dense  multitude,  hungering 
still  and  thirsting  for  the  words  of  eternal  life.  He  did  not  choose, 
therefore,  to  create  idle  delays  and  countenance  a  needless  ritualism 
by  washings,  which  at  that  moment  happened  to  be  quite  superfluous, 
and  to  which  a  foolish  and  pseudo-religious  importance  was  attached. 

Instantly  the  supercilious  astonishment  of  the  host  expressed  itself 
in  his  countenance ;  and,  doubtless,  the  lifted  eyebrows  and  depre- 
cating gestures  of  those  unsympathising  guests  showed  as  much  as 
they  dared  to  show  of  their  disapproval  and  contempt.  They  were 
forgetting  utterly  who  He  was,  and  what  He  had  done.  Spies  and 
calumniators  from  the  first,  they  were  now  debasing  even  their 
pretentious  and  patronising  hospitality  into  fresh  opportunity  for 
treacherous  conspiracy.  The  time  was  come  for  yet  plainer  language, 
for  yet  more  unmeasured  indignation ;  and  He  did  not  spare  them. 
He  exposed,  in  words  which  were  no  parables  and  could  not  be 
mistaken,  the  extent  to  which  their  outward  cleanliness  was  but  the 
thin  film  which  covered  their  inward  wickedness  and  greed.  He 
denounced  their  contemptible  scrupulosity  in  the  tithing  of  potherbs, 
their  flagrant  neglect  of  essential  virtues ;  the  cant,  the  ambition,  the 
publicity,  the  ostentation  of  their  outward  orthodoxy,  the  deathful 
corruption  of  their  inmost  hearts.  Hidden  graves  were  they  over 
which  men  walk,  and,  without  knowing  it,  become  defiled. 

And  at  this  point,  one  of  the  lawyers  who  were  present — some 
learned  professor,  some  orthodox  Masoret — ventures  to  interrupt  the 
majestic  torrent  of  His  rebuke.  He  had,  perhaps,  imagined  that  the 
youthful  Prophet  of  Nazareth — He  who  was  so  meek  and  lowly  of 
heart — He  whose  words  among  the  multitude  had  hitherto  breathed 
the  spirit  of  such  infinite  tenderness — was  too  gentle,  too  loving,  to  be 
in  earnest.  He  thought,  perhaps,  that  a  word  of  interpolation  might 
check  the  rushing  storm  of  His  awakened  wrath.  He  had  not  yet 
learnt  that  no  strong  or  great  character  can  be  devoid  of  the  element 
of  holy  anger.  And  so,  ignorant  of  all  that  was  passing  in  tho 


IHE    LIFE    Of   CHRIST.  2_'l 

Saviour's  mind,  amazed  that  people  of  such  high  distinction  could  be 
thus  plainly  and  severely  dealt  with,  he  murmured  in  deprecatory 
tones,  "  Master,  thus  saying,  thou  reproachest  us  also  ! " 

Yes,  He  reproached  them  also  :  they,  too,  heaped  on  the  shoulders 
of  others  the  burdens  which  themselves  refused  to  bear ;  they,  too, 
built  the  sepulchres  of  the  prophets  whom  their  sins  had  slain ;  hey, 
too,  set  their  backs  against  the  door  of  knowledge,  and  held  the  key, 
so  that  none  could  enter  in  ;  on  them  too,  as  on  all  that  guilty  genera- 
tion, should  come  the  blood  of  all  the  prophets,  from  the  blood  of 
Abel  to  the  blood  of  Zacharias,  who  perished  between  the  altar  and  the 
Temple. 

The  same  discourse,  but  yet  fuller  and  more  terrible,  was  subse- 
quently uttered  by  Jesus  in  the  Temple  of  Jerusalem  in  the  last  great 
week  of  His  life  on  earth ;  but  thus  did  He,  on  this  occasion,  hurl 
down  upon  them  from  the  heaven  of  His  moral  superiority  the  first 
heart-scathing  lightnings  of  His  seven-times-uttered-woe.  They 
thought,  perhaps,  that  He  would  have  been  deceived  by  their  specious 
smoothness  and  hypocritical  hospitality  ;  but  He  knew  that  it  was  not 
out  of  true  heart  that  they  offered  Him  even  the  barest  courtesies  of 
life.  The  fact  that  He  was  alone  among  them,  and  that  He  should 
have  been,  as  it  were,  betrayed  into  such  company,  was  but  an 
additional  reason  why  the  flames  of  warning  and  judgment  should  thus 
play  about  their  heads,  which  hereafter,  unless  they  repented,  should 
strike  them  to  the  earth.  Not  for  an  instant  could  they  succeed  in 
deceiving  Him.  There  is  a  spurious  kindness,  a  bitter  semblance  of 
friendship,  which  deserves  no  respect.  It  may  pass  current  in  the 
realms  of  empty  fashion  and  hollow  civility,  where  often  the  words  of 
men's  mouths  are  softer  than  butter,  having  war  in  their  heart,  and 
where,  though  their  throat  is  an  open  sepulchre,  they  flatter  with  their 
tongue ;  but  it  shrivels  to  nothing  before  the  refining  fire  of  a  divine 
discernment,  and  leaves  nothing  but  a  sickening  fume  behind.  The 
time  had  come  for  Him  to  show  to  these  hypocrites  how  well  he  knew 
the  deccitfulness  of  their  hearts,  how  deeply  He  hated  the  wickedness 
of  their  lives. 

They  felt  that  it  was  an  open  rupture.  The  feast  broke  up  in 
confusion.  The  Scribes  and  Pharisees  threw  off  the  mask.  From 
fawning  friends  and  interested  inquirers,  they  suddenly  sprang  up  in 
their  true  guise  as  deadly  opponents.  They  surrounded  Jesus,  they 
pressed  upon  Him  vehemently,  persistently,  almost  threateningly; 
they  began  to  pour  upon  Him  a  flood  of  questions,  to  examine,  to 


222  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

catechise  Him,  to  try  and  force  words  out  of  Him,  lying  in  ambush, 
like  eager  hunters,  to  spring  upon  any  confession  of  ignorance,  on  any 
mistake  of  fact — above  all,  on  any  trace  of  heresy  on  which  they 
might  found  that  legal  accusation  by  which  before  long  they  hoped  to 
put  Him  down. 

How  Jesus  escaped  from  this  unseemly  spectacle — how  He  was 
able  to  withdraw  Himself  from  this  display  of  hostility — we  are  not 
.  told.  Probably  it  might  be  sufficient  for  Him  to  waive  His  enemies 
aside,  and  bid  them  leave  Him  free  to  go  forth  again.  For,  mean- 
while, the  crowd  had  gained  some  suspicion,  or  received  some  intima- 
tion, of  what  was  going  on  within.  They  had  suddenly  gathered  in 
dense  myriads,  actually  treading  on  each  other  in  their  haste  and 
eagerness.  Perhaps  a  dull,  wrathful  murmur  from  without  warned 
the  Pharisees  in  time  that  it  might  be  dangerous  to  proceed  too  far, 
and  Jesus  came  out  to  the  multitude  with  His  whole  spirit  still  aglow 
with  the  just  and  mighty  indignation  by  which  it  had  been  pervaded. 
Instantly — addressing  primarily  His  own  disciples,  but  through  them 
the  listening  thousands — He  broke  out  with  a  solemn  warning, 
"  Beware  ye  of  the  leaven  of  the  Pharisees,  which  is  hypocrisy."  He 
warned  them  that  there  was  One  before  whose  eye — ten  thousand 
times  brighter  than  the  sun — secrecy  was  impossible.  He  bade  them 
not  be  afraid  of  man — a  fear  to  which  the  sad  perturbances  of  these 
last  few  days  might  well  have  inclined  them — but  to  fear  Him  who 
could  not  only  destroy  the  body,  but  cast  the  soul  also  into  the  Gehenna 
of  fire.  The  God  who  loved  them  would  care  for  them  ;  and  the  Son  of 
Man  would,  before  the  angels  of  God,  confess  them  who  confessed 
Him  before  men. 

"While  He  was  thus  addressing  them,  His  discourse  was  broken  in 
upon  by  a  most  inopportune  interruption — not  this  time  of  hostility, 
not  of  ill-timed  interference,  not  of  overpowering  admiration,  but  of 
simple  policy  and  self-interest.  Some  covetous  and  half -instructed 
member  of  the  crowd,  seeing  the  listening  throngs,  hearing  the  words 
of  authority  and  power,  aware  of  the  recent  discomfiture  of  the 
Pharisees,  expecting,  perhaps,  some  immediate  revelation  of  Messianic 
power,  determined  to  utilise  the  occasion  for  his  own  worldly  ends. 
He  thought — if  the  expression  may  be  allowed — that  he  could  do  a 
good  stroke  of  business,  and  most  incongruously  and  irreverently 
broke  in  with  the  request — 

"Master,  speak  to  my  brother,  that  he  divide  the  inheritance 
with  me." 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  223 

Almost  stern  was  our  Lord's  rebuke  to  the  man's  egregious  self- 
absorption.  He  seems  to  have  been  one  of  those  not  uncommon 
characters  to  whom  the  whole  universe  is  pervaded  by  self;  and 
be  seems  to  have  considered  that  the  main  object  of  the  Messiah's 
coming  would  be  to  secure  for  him  a  share  of  his  inheritance,  and  to 
overrule  this  unmanageable  brother.  Jesus  at  once  dispelled  his 
miserably  carnal  expectations,  and  then  warned  him,  and  all  who 
heard,  to  beware  of  letting  the  narrow  horizon  of  earthly  comforts 
span  their  hopes.  How  brief,  yet  how  rich  in  significance,  is  that 
little  parable  which  He  told  them,  of  the  rich  fool  who,  in  his  greedy, 
Grod-forgetting,  presumptuous  selfishness,  would  do  this  and  that,  and 
who,  as  though  there  were  no  such  thing  as  death,  and  as  though  the 
soul  could  live  by  bread,  thought  that  "  my  fruits  "  and  "my  goods," 
and  "'my  barns,"  and  to  "eat  and  drink  and  be  merry,"  could  for 
'many  years  to  come  sustain  what  was  left  him  of  a  soul,  but  to  whom 
from  heaven  pealed  as  a  terrible  echo  to  his  words  the  heart-thrilling 
sentence  of  awful  irony,  "  Thou  fool,  this  night  !  " 

And  then  our  Lord  expanded  the  thought.  He  told  them  that  the 
life  was  more  than  meat,  and  the  body  than  raiment.  Again  He  re- 
minded them  how  God  clothes,  in  more  than  Solomon's  glory,  the 
untoiling  lilies,  and  feeds  the  careless  ravens  that  neither  sow  nor 
reap.  Food  and  raiment,  and  the  multitude  of  possessions,  were  not 
life  :  they  had  better  things  to  seek  after  and  to  look  for  ;  let  them  not 
be  tossed  on  this  troubled  sea  of  faithless  care ;  be  theirs  the  life  of 
fearless  hope,  of  freest  charity,  the  life  of  the  girded  loin  and  the  burn- 
ing lamp — as  servants  watching  and  waiting  for  the  unknown  moment 
of  their  lord's  return. 

The  remarks  had  mainly  been  addressed  to  the  disciples,  though 
the  multitudes  also  heard  them,  and  were  by  no  means  excluded  from 
their  import.  But  here  Peter's  curiosity  got  the  better  of  him,  and  he 
asks  "  whether  the  parable  was  meant  specially  for  them,  or  even  for 
all?" 

To  that  question  our  Lord  did  not  reply,  and  His  silence  was  the 
best  reply.  Only  let  each  man  see  that  he  was  that  faithful  and  wise 
servant ;  blessed  indeed  should  he  then  be  ;  but  terrible  in  exact  pro- 
portion to  his  knowledge  and  his  privileges  should  be  the  fate  of  the 
gluttonous,  cruel,  faithless  drunkard  whom  the  Lord  should  surprise 
in  the  midst  of  his  iniquities. 

And  then — at  the  thought  of  that  awful  judgment — a  solemn  agony 
passed  over  the  spirit  of  Christ.  He  thought  of  the  rejected  peace, 


221)  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

•which  should  end  in  furious  war ;  he  thought  of  the  divided  house- 
holds and  the  separated  friends.  He  had  a  baptism  to  be  baptised 
with,  and  His  soul  was  straitened  with  anguish  till  it  was  accom- 
plished. He  had  come  to  fling  fire  upon  the  earth,  and  oh,  that  it  were 
already  kindled  ! — that  fire  was  as  a  spiritual  baptism,  the  refining  fire, 
which  should  at  once  inspire  and  blind,  at  once  illuminate  and  destroy, 
at  once  harden  the  clay  and  melt  the  gold.  And  here  we  are  reminded 
of  one  of  those  remarkable  though  only  traditional  utterances  attri- 
buted to  Christ,  which  may  possibly  have  been  connected  with  the 
thought  here  expressed — 

"He  who  is  near  me  is  near  the  fire !  he  who  is  far  from  me  is  far 
from  the  kingdom." 

But  from  these  sad  thoughts  He  once  more  descended  to  the 
immediate  needs  of  the  multitude.  From  the  reddening  heaven,  from 
the  rising  clouds,  they  could  foretell  that  the  showers  would  fall  or 
that  the  burning  wind  would  blow — why  could  they  not  discern  the 
signs  of  the  times  ?  Were  they  not  looking  into  the  far-off  fields  of 
heaven  for  signs  which  were  in  the  air  they  breathed,  and  on  the 
ground  they  trod  upon ;  and,  most  of  all — had  they  but  searched 
rightly — in  the  state  of  their  own  most  inmost  souls  ?  If  they  would 
see  the  star  which  should  at  once  direct  their  feet  and  influence  their 
destiny,  they  must  look  for  it,  not  in  the  changing  skies  of  outward 
circumstance,  but  each  in  the  depth  of  his  own  heart.  Let  them  seize 
the  present  opportunity  to  make  peace  with  God.  For  men  and  for 
nations  the  "  too  late  "  comes  at  last. 

And  there  the  discourse  seems  to  have  ended.  It  was  the  last 
time  for  many  days  that  they  were  to  hear  His  words.  Surrounded 
by  enemies  who  were  not  only  powerful,  but  now  deeply  exasperated 
— obnoxious  to  the  immediate  courtiers  of  the  very  king  in  whose 
dominion  He  was  living — dogged  by  the  open  hatred  and  secret 
conspiracies  of  spies  whom  the  multitude  had  been  taught  to  reverence 
— feeling  that  the  people  understood  Him  not,  and  that  in  the  minds 
of  their  leaders  and  teachers  sentence  of  death  and  condemnation  had 
already  been  passed  upon  Him — He  turned  His  back  for  a  time  upon 
His  native  land,  and  went  to  seek  in  idolatrous  and  alien  cities  the 
rest  and  peace  which  were  denied  Him  in  His  home. 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  225 

CHAPTER      XXXIV. 

AMONS  THE   HEATHEN. 

"  THEN  Jesus  went  thence,  and  departed  into  the  regions  of  Tyre  and 
Sidon." 

Such  is  the  brief  notice  which  prefaces  the  few  and  scanty  records 
of  a  period  of  His  life  and  work  of  which,  had  it  been  vouchsafed  to 
us,  we  should  have  been  deeply  interested  to  learn  something  more. 
But  only  a  single  incident  of  this  visit  to  heathendom  has  been  recorded. 
It  might  have  seemed  that  in  that  distant  region  there  would  be  a  cer- 
tainty, not  of  safety  only,  but  even  of  repose ;  but  it  was  not  so.  We 
have  already  seen  traces  that  the  fame  of  His  miracles  had  penetrated 
even  to  the  old  Phoenician  cities,  and  no  sooner  had  He  reached  their 
neighbourhood  than  it  became  evident  that  He  could  not  be  hid.  A 
woman  sought  for  Him,  and  followed  the  little  company  of  wayfarers 
with  passionate  entreaties — "  Have  mercy  on  me,  O  Lord,  Thou  Son 
of  David  :  my  daughter  is  grievously  vexed  with  a  devil." 

We  might  have  imagined  that  our  Lord  would  answer  such  a 
prayer  with  immediate  and  tender  approbation,  and  all  the  more 
because,  in  granting  her  petition,  Ho  would  symbolically  have  been 
representing  the  extension  of  His  kingdom  to  the  three  greatest 
branches  of  the  Pagan  world.  For  this  woman  was  by  birth  a 
Canaanite,  and  a  Syro-Phoenician ;  by  position  a  Roman  subject ;  by 
culture  and  language  a  Greek ;  and  her  appeal  for  mercy  to  the 
Messiah  of  the  Chosen  People  might  well  look  like  the  first-fruits  of 
that  harvest  in  which  the  good  seed  should  spring  up  hereafter  in  Tyre 
and  Sidon,  and  Carthage,  and  Greece,  and  Rome.  But  Jesus — and  is 
not  this  one  of  the  numberless  indications  that  we  are  dealing,  not 
with  loose  and  false  tradition,  but  with  solid  fact  ? — "  Jesus  answered 
her  not  a  word." 

In  no  other  single  instance  are  we  told  of  a  similar  apparent  cold- 
ness on  the  part  of  Christ;  nor  are  we  here  informed  of  the  causes 
which  influenced  His  actions.  Two  alone  suggest  themselves:  He 
may  have  desired  to  test  the  feelings  of  His  disciples,  who,  in  the 
narrow  spirit  of  Judaic  exclusiveness,  might  be  unprepared  to  see 
Him  grant  His  blessings,  not  only  to  a  Gentile,  but  a  Canaanite,  and 
descendant  of  the  accursed  race.  It  was  true  that  He  had  healed  the 
servant  of  the  centurion,  but  he  was  perhaps  a  Roman,  certainly  a 


226  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

benefactor  to  the  Jews,  and  in  all  probability  a  proselyte  of  the  gate. 
But  it  is  more  likely  that,  knowing  what  would  follow,  He  may  have 
desired  to  test  yet  further  the  woman's  faith,  both  that  He  might 
crown  it  with  a  more  complete  and  glorious  reward,  and  that  she 
might  learn  something  deeper  respecting  Him  than  the  mere  Jewish 
title  that  she  may  have  accidentally  picked  up.  And  further  than  this, 
since  every  miracle  is  also  rich  in  moral  significance,  He  may  have 
wished  for  all  time  to  encourage  us  in  our  prayers  and  hopes,  and 
teach  us  to  persevere,  even  when  it  might  seem  that  His  face  is  dark 
to  us,  or  that  His  ear  is  turned  away. 

Weary  with  the  importunity  of  her  cries,  the  disciples  begged  Him 
to  send  her  away.  But,  as  if  even  their  intercession  would  be  unavail- 
ing, He  said,  "  I  am  not  sent  but  unto  the  lost  sheep  of  the  house  of 
Israel." 

Then  she  came  and  fell  at  his  feet,  and  began  to  worship  Him, 
saying,  "  Lord,  help  me."  Could  He  indeed  remain  untouched  by  that 
sorrow  ?  Could  He  reject  that  appeal  ?  and  would  He  leave  her  to 
return  to  the  life-long  agony  of  watching  the  paroxysms  of  her 
demoniac  child  ?  Calmly  and  coldly  came  from  those  lips  that  never 
yet  had  answered  with  anything  but  mercy  to  a  suppliant's  prayer — 
"It  is  not  meet  to  take  the  children's  bread,  and  to  cast  it  to 
dogs." 

Such  an  answer  might  well  have  struck  a  chill  into  her  soul ;  and 
had  He  not  foreseen  that  hers  was  the  rare  trust  which  can  see  mercy 
and  acceptance  even  in  apparent  rejection,  He  would  not  so  have 
answered  her.  But  not  all  the  snows  of  her  native  Lebanon  could 
quench  the  fire  of  love  which  was  burning  on  the  altar  of  her  heart, 
and  promptly  as  an  echo  came  forth  the  glorious  and  immortal 
answer — 

"  Truth,  Lord ;  then  let  me  share  the  condition,  not  of  the  children 
but  of  the  dogs,  for  even  the  dogs  eat  of  the  crumbs  which  fall  from 
their  masters'  table." 

She  had  triumphed,  and  more  than  triumphed.  Not  one  moment 
longer  did  her  Lord  prolong  the  agony  of  her  suspense.  "  0  woman," 
He  exclaimed,  "  great  is  thy  faith  :  be  it  unto  thee  even  as  thou  wilt." 
And  with  his  usual  beautiful  and  graphic  simplicity  St.  Mark  ends 
the  narrative  with  the  touching  words,  "  And  when  she  was  come  to 
her  house,  she  found  the  devil  gone  out,  and  her  daughter  laid  upon 
the  bed." 

How  long  our  Lord  remained  in  these  regions,  and  at  what  spot 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  227 

He  stayed,  we  do  not  know.  Probably  His  departure  was  hastened  by 
the  publicity  which  attended  His  movements  even  there,  and  which — in 
a  region  where  it  had  been  His  object  quietly  to  train  his  own  nearest 
and  most  beloved  followers,  and  not  either  to  preach  or  to  work  deeds 
of  mercy — would  only  impede  His  work.  He  therefore  left  that 
interesting  land.  On  Tyre,  with  its  commercial  magnificence,  its  ancient 
traditions,  its  gorgeous  and  impure  idolatries,  its  connection  with  the 
history  and  prophecies  of  his  native  land — on  Sarepta,  with  its 
memories  of  Elijah's  flight  and  Elijah's  miracles — on  Sidon,  with  its 
fisheries  of  the  purple  limpet,  its  tombs  of  once-famous  and  long- 
forgotten  kings,  its  minarets  rising  out  of  their  groves  of  palm  and 
citron,  beside  the  blue  historic  sea — on  the  white  wings  of  the 
countless  vessels,  sailing  to  the  Isles  of  the  Gentiles,  and  to  all  the 
sunny  and  famous  regions  of  Greece  and  Italy  and  Spain — He  would 
doubtless  look  with  a  feeling  of  mingled  sorrow  and  interest.  But 
His  work  did  not  lie  here,  and  leaving  behind  Him  those  Phoenician 
shrines  of  Melkarth  and  Asherah,  of  Baalim  and  Ashtaroth,  He  turned 
eastward — probably  through  the  deep  gorge  of  the  rushing  and 
beautiful  Leontes — and  so  reaching  the  sources  of  the  Jordan,  travelled 
southward  on  its  further  bank  into  the  regions  of  Decapolis. 

Decapolis  was  the  name  given  to  a  district  east  of  the  Jordan, 
extending  as  far  north  (apparently)  as  Damascus,  and  as  far  south  as 
the  river  Jabbok,  which  formed  the  northern  limit  of  Persea.  It  was 
a  confederacy  of  ten  free  cities,  in  a  district  which,  on  their  return 
from  exile,  the  Jews  had  never  been  able  to  recover,  and  which  was 
therefore  mainly  occupied  by  Gentiles,  who  formed  a  separate  section 
of  the  Roman  province.  The  reception  of  Jesus  in  this  semi-pagan 
district  seems  to  have  been  favourable.  Wherever  He  went  He  was 
unable  to  abstain  from  exercising  Hia  miraculous  powers  in  favour  of 
the  sufferers  for  whom  His  aid  was  sought ;  and  in  one  of  these  cities 
He  was  entreated  to  heal  a  man  who  was  deaf,  and  could  scarcely 
speak.  He  might  have  healed  him  by  a  word,  but  there  were 
evidently  circumstances  in  his  case  which  rendered  it  desirable  to 
make  the  cure  gradual,  and  to  effect  it  by  visible  signs.  He  took  the 
man  aside,  put  His  fingers  in  his  ears,  and  spat,  and  touched  his 
tongue  ;  and  then  St.  Mark  preserves  for  us  the  sight,  and  the  uplifted 
glance,  as  He  spoke  the  one  word,  "  Ephphatha  !  Be  opened  !  "  Here 
again  it  is  not  revealed  to  us  what  were  the  immediate  influences 
which  saddened  His  spirit.  He  may  have  sighed  in  pity  for  the  man ; 
He  may  have  sighed  in  pity  for  the  race ;  He  may  have  sighed  for  all 

Q  2 


228  THE  LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

the  sins  that  degrade  and  all  the  sufferings  which  torture;  but 
certainly  He  sighed  in  a  spirit  of  deep  tenderness  and  compassion,  and 
certainly  that  sigh  ascended  like  an  infinite  intercession  into  the  ears 
of  the  Lord  God  of  Hosts. 

The  multitudes  of  that  outlying  region,  unfamiliar  with  His 
miracles,  were  beyond  measure  astonished.  His  injunction  of  secrecy 
was  as  usual  disregarded,  and  all  hope  of  seclusion  was  at  an  end. 
The  cure  had  apparently  been  wrought  in  close  vicinity  to  the  eastern 
shore  of  the  Sea  of  Galilee,  and  great  multitudes  followed  Jesus  to  the 
summit  of  a  hill  overlooking  the  lake,  and  there  bringing  their  lame, 
and  blind,  and  maimed,  and  dumb,  they  laid  them  at  the  feet  of  the 
Good  Physician,  and  He  healed  them  all.  Filled  with  intense  and 
joyful  amazement,  these  people  of  Decapolis  could  not  tear  themselves 
from  His  presence,  and — semi-pagans  as  they  were — they  "glorified 
the  God  of  Israel." 

Three  days  they  had  now  been  with  Him,  and,  as  many  of  them 
came  from  a  distance,  their  food  was  exhausted.  Jesus  pitied  them, 
and  seeing  their  faith,  and  unwilling  that  they  should  faint  by  the 
way,  once  more  spread  for  His  people  a  table  in  the  wilderness. 
Some  have  wondered  that,  in  answer  to  the  expression  of  His  pity, 
the  disciples  did  not  at  once  anticipate  or  suggest  what  He  should  do. 
But  surely  here  there  is  a  touch  of  delicacy  and  truth.  They  knew 
that  there  was  in  Him  no  prodigality  of  the  supernatural,  no  lavish 
and  needless  exercise  of  miraculous  power.  Many  and  many  a  time 
had  they  been  with  multitudes  before,  and  yet  on  one  occasion  only 
had  He  fed  them ;  and  moreover,  after  He  had  done  so,  He  had  most 
sternly  rebuked  those  who  came  to  Him  in  expectation  of  a  repeated 
offer  of  such  gifts,  and  had  uttered  a  discourse  so  searching  and 
strange  that  it  alienated  from  Him  many  even  of  His  friends.  For 
them  to  suggest  to  Him  a  repetition  of  the  feeding  of  the  five  thousand 
would  bo  a  presumption  which  their  ever-deepening  reverence  forbade, 
and  forbade  more  than  ever  as  they  recalled  how  persistently  He  had 
refused  to  work  a  sign,  such  as  this  was,  at  the  bidding  of  others. 
But  no  sooner  had  He  given  them  the  signal  of  His  intention,  than 
with  perfect  faith  they  became  His  ready  ministers.  They  seated  tho 
multitude,  and  distributed  to  them  the  miraculous  multiplication  of 
the  seven  loaves  and  the  few  small  fishes ;  and,  this  time  unbidden, 
they  gathered  the  fragments  that  remained,  and  with  them  filled 
seven  large  baskets  of  rope,  after  the  multitude — four  thousand  in 
number,  besides  women  and  children — had  eaten  and  were  filled. 


THE   LIFE   OP  CHRIST.  229 

And  then  kindly  and  peacefully,  and  with  no  exhibition  on  the  part 
of  the  populace  of  that  spurious  excitement  which  had  marked  the 
former  miracle,  the  Lord  and  His  Apostles  joined  in  sending  away  the 
rejoicing  and  grateful  throng. 


CHAPTER    XXXV. 

THE   GREAT   CONFESSION. 

VERY  different  was  the  reception  which  awaited  Jesus  on  the  farther 
shore.  The  poor  heathens  of  Decapolis  had  welcomed  Him  with 
reverent  enthusiasm :  the  haughty  Pharisees  of  Jerusalem  met  Him 
with  sneering  hate.  It  may  be  that,  after  this  period  of  absence,  His 
human  soul  yearned  for  the  only  resting-place  which  He  could  call  a 
home.  Entering  into  His  little  vessel,  He  sailed  across  the  lake  to 
Magdala.  It  is  probable  that  He  purposely  avoided  sailing  to  Beth- 
saida  or  Capernaum,  which  are  a  little  north  of  Magdala,  and  which 
had  become  the  head-quarters  of  the  hostile  Pharisees.  But  it  seems 
that  these  personages  had  kept  a  look-out  for  His  arrival.  As  though 
they  had  been  watching  from  the  tower  of  Magdala  for  the  sail  of  His 
returning  vessel,  barely  had  He  set  foot  on  shore  than  they  came  forth 
to  meet  Him.  Nor  were  they  alone :  this  time  they  were  accompanied 
— ill-omened  conjunction ! — with  their  rivals  and  enemies  the  Sad- 
ducees,  that  sceptical  sect,  half -religious,  half-political,  to  which  at 
this  time  belonged  the  two  High  Priests,  as  well  as  the  members  of  the 
reigning  family.  Every  section  of  the  ruling  classes — the  Pharisees, 
formidable  from  their  religious  weight  among  the  people  ;  the  Sad- 
ducees,  few  in  number,  but  powerful  from  wealth  and  position ;  the 
Herodians,  representing  the  influence  of  the  Romans,  and  of  their 
nominees  the  tetrarchs ;  the  scribes  and  lawyers,  bringing  to  bear  the 
authority  of  their  orthodoxy  and  their  learning — were  all  united 
against  Him  in  one  firm  phalanx  of  conspiracy  and  opposition,  and 
were  determined  above  all  things  to  hinder  his  preaching,  and  to 
alienate  from  Him,  as  far  as  was  practicable,  the  affections  of  the 
people  among  whom  most  of  His  mighty  works  were  done. 

They  had  already  found  by  experience  that  the  one  most  effectual 


230  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

•weapon  to  discredit  His  mission  and  undermine  His  influence  was  the 
demand  of  a  sign — above  all,  a  sign  from  heaven.  If  He  were  indeed 
the  Messiah,  why  should  He  not  give  them  bread  from  heaven  as 
Moses,  they  said,  had  done?  where  were  Samuel's  thunder  and 
Elijah's  flame?  why  should  not  the  sun  be  darkened,  and  the  moon 
turned  into  blood,  and  the  stars  of  heaven  be  shaken  ?  why  should  not 
some  fiery  pillar  glide  before  them  to  victory,  or  the  burst  of  some 
stormy  Bath  Kol  ratify  His  words  ? 

They  knew  that  no  such  sign  would  be  granted  them,  and  they 
knew  that  He  had  vouchsafed  to  them  the  strongest  reasons  for  His 
thrice-repeated  refusal  to  gratify  their  presumptuous  and  unspiritual 
demand.  Had  they  known  or  understood  the  fact  of  His  temptation 
in  the  wilderness,  they  would  have  known  that  His  earliest  answers  to 
the  tempter  were  uttered  in  this  very  spirit  of  utter  self-abnegation. 
Had  He  granted  their  request,  what  purpose  would  have  been  fur- 
thered ?  It  is  not  the  influence  of  external  forces,  but  it  is  the  ger- 
minal principle  of  life  within,  which  makes  the  good  seed  to  grow ; 
nor  can  the  hard  heart  be  converted,  or  the  stubborn  unbelief  removed, 
by  portents  and  prodigies,  but  by  inward  humility,  and  the  grace  of 
God  stealing  downward  like  the  dew  of  heaven,  in  silence  and  unseen. 
What  would  have  ensued  had  the  sign  been  vouchsafed  ?  By  its 
actual  eye-witnesses  it  would  have  been  attributed  to  demoniac  agency; 
by  those  to  whom  it  was  reported  it  would  have  been  explained  away ; 
by  those  of  the  next  generation  it  would  have  been  denied  as  an  inven- 
tion, or  evaporated  into  a  myth. 

But  in  spite  of  all  this,  the  Pharisees  and  Sadducees  felt  that  for 
the  present  this  refusal  to  gratify  their  demand  gave  them  a  handle 
against  Jesus,  and  was  an  effectual  engine  for  weakening  the  admira- 
tion of  the  people.  Yet  not  for  one  moment  did  He  hesitate  in  reject- 
ing this  their  temptation.  He  would  not  work  any  epideictic  miracle 
at  their  bidding,  any  more  than  at  the  bidding  of  the  tempter.  He  at 
once  told  them,  as  He  had  told  them  before,  that  "  no  sign  should  be 
given  them  but  the  sign  of  the  prophet  Jonah."  Pointing  to  the 
western  sky,  now  crimson  with  the  deepening  hues  of  sunset,  He  said, 
"  When  it  is  evening,  ye  say,  '  Fair  weather  !  for  the  sky  is  red  ; '  and 
in  the  morning,  '  Storm  to-day,  for  the  sky  is  red  and  frowning.' 
Hypocrites !  ye  know  how  to  discern  the  face  of  the  sky  :  can  ye  not 
learn  the  signs  of  the  times  ?  " 

As  He  spoke  He  heaved  a  deep  inward  sigh.  For  some  time  He 
had  been  absent  from  home.  He  had  been  sought  out  with  trustful 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  231 

faith  in  the  regions  of  Tyre  and  Sidon.  He  had  been  welcomed  with 
ready  gratitude  in  heathen  Decapolis  ;  here,  at  home,  he  was  met  with 
the  flaunt  of  triumphant  opposition,  under  the  guise  of  hypocritic  zeal. 
He  steps  ashore  on  the  lovely  plain,  where  He  had  done  so  many  noble 
and  tender  deeds,  and  spoken  for  all  time  such  transcendent  and  im- 
mortal words.  He  came  back,  haply  to  work  once  more  in  the  little 
district  where  His  steps  had  once  been  followed  by  rejoicing  thousands, 
hanging  in  deep  silence  on  every  word  He  spoke.  As  He  approaches 
Magdala,  the  little  village  destined  for  all  time  to  lend  its  name  to  a 
word  expressive  of  His  most  divine  compassion — as  He  wishes  to  enter 
once  more  the  little  cities  and  villages  which  offered  to  His  homeless- 
ness  the  only  shadow  of  a  home — here,  barely  has  He  stepped  upon 
the  pebbly  strand,  barely  passed  through  the  fringe  of  flowering  shrubs 
which  embroider  the  water's  edge,  barely  listened  to  the  twittering  of 
the  innumerable  birds  which  welcome  Him  back  with  their  familiar 
sounds — when  He  finds  all  the  self-satisfied  hypocrisies  of  a  decadent 
religion  drawn  up  in  array  to  stop  His  path  ! 

He  did  not  press  His  mercies  on  those  who  rejected  them.  As  in 
after  days  Hia  nation  were  suffered  to  prefer  their  robber  and  their 
murderer  to  the  Lord  of  Life,  so  now  the  Galileeans  were  suffered  to 
keep  their  Pharisees  and  lose  their  Christ.  He  left  them  as  He  had 
left  the  Gadarenes — rejected,  not  suffered  to  rest  even  in  His  home ; 
with  heavy  heart,  solemnly  and  sadly  He  left  them — left  them  then  and 
there — left  them,  to  revisit,  indeed,  once  more  their  neighbourhood, 
but  never  again  to  return  publicly — never  again  to  work  miracles,  to 
teach  or  preach. 

It  must  have  been  late  in  that  autumn  evening  when  He  stepped 
once  more  into  the  little  ship,  and  bade  His  disciples  steer  their  course 
towards  Bethsaida  Julias,  at  the  northern  end  of  the  lake.  On  their 
way  they  must  have  sailed  by  the  bright  sands  of  the  western  Beth- 
saida, on  which  Peter  and  the  sons  of  Zebedee  had  played  in  their 
infancy,  and  must  have  seen  the  white  marble  synagogue  of  Caper- 
naum flinging  its  shadow  across  the  waters,  which  blushed  with  the 
reflected  colours  of  the  sunset.  Was  it  at  such  a  moment,  when  He 
was  leaving  Galilee  with  the  full  knowledge  that  His  work  there  was 
at  an  end,  and  that  He  was  sailing  away  from  it  under  the  ban  of 
partial  excommunication  and  certain  death — was  it  at  that  supreme 
moment  of  sorrow  that  He  uttered  the  rhythmic  woe  in  which  He  up- 
braided the  unrepentant  cities  wherein  most  of  His  mighty  works  were 
done  ? — 


232  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

"  Woe  unto  thee,  Chorazin !  woe  unto  thee,  Bethsaida !  for  if  the 
mighty  works  which  have  been  done  in  you  had  been  done  in  Tyre  and 
Sidon,  they  would  have  repented  long  ago  in  sackcloth  and  ashes. 

"  But  I  say  unto  you,  That  it  shall  be  more  tolerable  for  Tyre  and 
Sidon  at  the  day  of  judgment  than  for  you. 

"And  thou,  Capernaum,  which  art  exalted  unto  heaven,  shalt  be 
brought  down  to  hell :  for  if  the  mighty  works  which  have  been  done 
in  thee  had  been  done  in  Sodom,  it  would  have  remained  until  this 
day. 

"  But  I  say  unto  you,  That  it  shall  be  more  tolerable  for  the  land 
of  Sodom  in  the  day  of  judgment  than  for  thee  !  " 

Whether  these  touching  words  were  uttered  on  this  occasion  as  a 
stern  and  sad  farewell  to  His  public  ministry  in  the  land  He  loved,  we 
cannot  tell :  but  certainly  His  soul  was  still  filled  with  sorrow  for  the 
unbelief  and  hardness  of  heart,  the  darkened  intellects  and  corrupted 
consciences  of  those  who  were  thus  leaving  for  Him  no  power  to  set 
foot  in  His  native  land.  It  has  been  said  by  a  great  forensic  orator, 
that  "  no  form  of  self-deceit  is  more  hateful  and  detestable  .... 
than  that  which  veils  spite  and  falsehood  under  the  guise  of  frankness, 
and  behind  the  profession  of  religion."  Repugnance  to  this  hideous 
vice  must  have  been  prominent  in  the  stricken  heart  of  Jesus,  when, 
as  the  ship  sailed  along  the  pleasant  shore  upon  its  northward  way, 
He  said  to  His  disciples,  "  Take  heed,  and  beware  of  the  leaven  of  the 
Pharisees  and  Sadducees." 

He  added  nothing  more ;  and  this  remark  the  strange  simplicity  of 
the  disciples  foolishly  misinterpreted.  They  were  constantly  taking 
His  figurative  expressions  literally,  and  His  literal  expressions  meta- 
phorically. When  He  called  Himself  the  "bread  from  heaven,"  they 
thought  the  saying  hard ;  when  He  said,  "  I  have  meat  to  eat  that  ye 
know  not  of,"  they  could  only  remark,  "  Hath  any  man  brought  Him 
aught  to  eat  ? "  when  He  said,  "  Our  friend  Lazarus  sleepeth,"  they 
answered,  "  Lord,  if  he  sleep,  he  shall  do  well."  And  so  now,  although 
leaven  was  one  of  the  very  commonest  types  of  sin,  and  especially  of 
insidious  and  subterranean  sin,  the  only  interpretation  which,  after  a 
discussion  among  themselves,  they  could  attach  to  His  remark  was, 
that  He  was  warning  them  not  to  buy  leaven  of  the  Pharisees  and  Sad- 
ducees, or,  perhaps,  indirectly  reproaching  them  because,  in  the  sorrow 
nnd  hurry  of  their  unexpected  re-embarkation,  they  had  only  brought 
with  them  one  single  loaf !  Jesus  was  grieved  at  this  utter  non-com- 
prehension, this  almost  stupid  literalism.  Did  they  suppose  that  He 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  238 

at  whose  words  the  loaves  and  fishes  had  been  so  miraculously  multi- 
plied— that  they,  who  after  feeding  the  five  thousand  had  gathered 
twelve  hand-baskets,  and  after  feeding  the  four  thousand  had  gathered 
seven  large  baskets-full  of  the  fragments  that  remained — did  they 
suppose,  after  that,  that  there  was  danger  lest  He  or  they  should  suffer 
from  starvation  ?  There  was  something  almost  of  indignation  in  the 
rapid  questions  in  which,  without  correcting,  He  indicated  their  error. 
"  Why  reason  ye  because  ye  have  no  bread  ?  Perceive  ye  not  yet, 
neither  understand  ?  Have  ye  your  heart  yet  hardened  ?  Having 
eyes,  see  ye  not  ?  and  having  ears,  hear  ye  not  ?  and  do  ye  not 
remember?"  And  then  once  more,  after  he  had  reminded  them  of 
those  miracles,  "How  is  it  that  ye  do  not  understand?"  They  had 
not  ventured  to  ask  him  for  any  explanation ;  there  was  something 
about  Him — something  so  awe-inspiring  and  exalted  in  his  personality 
— that  their  love  for  Him,  intense  though  it  was,  was  tempered  by  an 
overwhelming  reverence :  but  now  it  began  to  dawn  upon  them  that 
something  else  was  meant,  and  that  He  was  bidding  them  beware,  not 
of  the  leaven  of  bread,  but  of  the  doctrine  of  the  Pharisees  and 
Sadducees. 

At  Bethsaida  Julias,  probably  on  the  following  morning,  a  blind 
man  was  brought  to  Him  for  healing.  The  cure  was  wrought  in  a 
manner  very  similar  to  that  of  the  deaf  and  dumb  man  in  Decapolis. 
It  has  none  of  the  ready  freedom,  the  radiant  spontaneity  of  the  earlier 
and  happier  miracles.  In  one  respect  it  differs  from  every  other 
recorded  miracle,  for  it  was,  as  it  were,  tentative.  Jesus  took 
the  man  by  the  hand,  led  him  out  of  the  village,  spat  upon  his 
eyes,  and  then,  laying  His  hands  upon  them,  asked  if  he  saw. 
The  man  looked  at  the  figures  in  the  distance,  and,  but  imperfectly 
cured  as  yet,  said,  "  I  see  men  as  trees  walking."  Not  until 
Jesus  had  laid  His  hands  a  second  time  upon  his  eyes  did  he  see 
clearly.  And  then  Jesus  bade  him  go  to  his  house,  which  was  not  at 
Bethsaida:  for,  with  an  emphatic  repetition  of  the  word,  he  is  for- 
bidden either  to  enter  into  the  town,  or  to  tell  it  to  any  one  in  the 
town.  We  cannot  explain  the  causes  of  the  method  which  Christ 
hero  adopted.  The  impossibility  of  understanding  what  guided  His 
actions  arises  from  the  brevity  of  the  narrative,  in  which  the  Evan- 
gelist— as  is  so  often  the  case  with  writers  conversant  with  their 
subject — passes  over  many  particulars,  which,  because  they  were  so 
familiar  to  himself,  will,  he  supposes,  be  self-explaining  to  those  who 
read  his  words.  All  that  we  can  dimly  see  is  Christ's  dislike  and 


234  THE   LIFE   OP  CHRIST. 

avoidance  of  these  heathenish  Herodian  towns,  with  their  borrowed 
Hellenic  architecture,  their  careless  customs,  and  even  their  very 
names  commemorating,  as  was  the  case  with  Bethsaida  Julias,  some 
of  the  most  contemptible  of  the  human  race.  We  see  from  the 
Gospels  themselves  that  the  richness  and  power  displayed  in  the 
miracles  was  correlative  to  the  faith  of  the  recipients:  in  places 
where  faith  was  scanty  it  was  but  too  natural  thai  miracles  should 
be  gradual  and  few. 

Leaving  Bethsaida  Julias,  Jesus  made  His  way  towards  Caesarea 
Philippi.  Here,  again,  it  seems  to  be  distinctly  intimated  that  He  did 
not  enter  into  the  town  itself,  but  only  visited  the  "  coasts  "  of  it,  or 
wandered  about  the  neighbouring  villages.  Why  He  bent  His  foot- 
steps in  that  direction  we  are  not  told.  It  was  a  town  that  had  seen 
many  vicissitudes.  As  "  Laish,"  it  had  been  the  possession  of  the 
careless  Sidonians.  As  "  Dan,"  it  had  been  the  chief  refuge  of  a 
warlike  tribe  of  Israel,  the  northern  limit  of  the  Israelitish  kingdom, 
and  the  seat  of  the  idolatry  of  the  golden  calf.  Colonised  by  Greeks, 
its  name  had  been  changed  into  Paneas,  in  honour  of  the  cave  under 
its  towering  hill,  which  had  been  artificially  fashioned  into  a  grotto  of 
Pan,  and  adorned  with  niches,  which  once  contained  statues  of  his 
sylvan  nymphs.  As  the  capital  of  Herod  Philip,  it  had  been  re-named 
in  honour  of  himself  and  his  patron  Tiberius.  The  Lord  might  gaze 
with  interest  on  the  noble  ranges  of  Libanus  and  Anti-Libanus ;  He 
might  watch  the  splendid  and  snowy  mass  of  Hermon  glittering  under 
the  dawn,  or  flushed  with  its  evening  glow  ;  He  might  wander  round 
Lake  Phiala,  and  see  where,  according  to  popular  belief,  the  Jordan, 
after  his  subterranean  course,  bursts  rejoicing  into  the  light :  but  He 
could  only  have  gazed  with  sorrow  on  the  city  itself,  with  its  dark 
memories  of  Israelitish  apostacy,  its  poor  mimicry  of  Roman  Impe- 
rialism, and  the  broken  statues  of  its  unhallowed  and  Hellenic  cave. 

But  it  was  on  His  way  to  the  northern  region  that  there  occurred 
an  incident  which  may  well  be  regarded  as  the  culminating  point  of 
His  earthly  ministry.  He  was  alone.  The  crowd  that  surged  so 
tnmultuously  about  Him  in  more  frequented  districts,  here  only 
followed  Him  at  a  distance.  Only  His  disciples  were  near  Him  as  He 
stood  apart  in  solitary  prayer.  And  when  the  prayer  was  over,  He 
beckoned  them  about  Him  as  they  continued  their  journey,  and  asked 
them  those  two  momentous  questions,  on  the  answers  to  which  de- 
pended the  whole  outcome  of  His  work  on  earth. 
First  He  asked  them — 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHEIST.  235 

"  Whom  do  men  say  that  I  the  Son  of  Man  am  ?  " 

The  answer  was  a  sad  one.  The  Apostles  dared  not  and  would 
not  speak  aught  but  the  words  of  soberness  and  truth,  and 
they  made  the  disheartening  admission  that  the  Messiah  had  not 
been  recognised  by  the  world  which  He  came  to  save.  They  could 
only  repeat  the  idle  guesses  of  the  people.  Some,  echoing  the  verdict 
of  the  guilty  conscience  of  Antipas,  said  that  He  was  John  the 
Baptist ;  some,  who  may  have  heard  the  sterner  denunciations  of  His 
impassioned  grief,  caught  in  that  mighty  utterance  the  thunder-tones 
of  a  new  Elijah ;  others,  who  had  listened  to  His  accents  of  tenderness 
and  words  of  universal  love,  saw  in  Him  the  plaintive  soul  of  Jeremiah, 
and  thought  that  he  had  come,  perhaps,  to  restore  them  the  lost  Urim 
and  the  vanished  Ark  :  many  looked  on  Him  as  a  prophet  and  a 
precursor.  None — in  spite  of  an  occasional  Messianic  cry  wrung  from 
the  admiration  of  the  multitude,  amazed  by  some  unwonted  display  of 
power — none  dreamt  of  who  He  was.  The  light  had  shone  in  the 
darkness,  and  the  darkness  comprehended  it  not. 

"  But  whom  say  ye  that  I  am  ?  " 

Had  that  great  question  been  answered  otherwise — could  it 
have  been  answered  otherwise — the  world's  whole  destinies  might 
have  been  changed.  Had  it  been  answered  otherwise,  then,  humanly 
speaking,  so  far  the  mission  of  the  Saviour  would  have  wholly 
failed,  and  Christianity  and  Christendom  have  never  been.  For 
the  work  of  Christ  on  earth  lay  mainly  with  His  disciples.  He 
sowed  the  seed,  they  reaped  the  harvest;  He  converted  them,  and 
they  the  world.  He  had  never  openly  spoken  of  His  Messiah- 
ship.  John  indeed  had  borne  witness  to  Him,  and  to  those  who 
could  receive  it  He  had  indirectly  intimated,  both  in  word  and 
deed,  that  He  was  the  Son  of  God.  But  it  was  his  will  that  the  light 
of  revelation  should  dawn  gradually  on  the  minds  of  His  children ; 
that  it  should  spring  more  from  the  truth?  He  spake,  and  the  life  He 
lived,  than  from  the  wonders  which  He  wrought ;  that  it  should  be 
conveyed  not  in  sudden  thunder-crashes  of  supernatural  majesty  or 
visions  of  unutterable  glory,  but  through  the  quiet  medium  of  a  sinless 
and  self-sacrificing  course.  It  was  in  the  Son  of  Man  that  they  were 
to  recognise  the  Son  of  God. 

But  the  answer  came,  as  from  everlasting  it  had  been  written  in  the 
book  of  destiny  that  it  should  come ;  and  Peter,  the  ever  warm-hearted, 
the  coryphaeus  of  the  Apostolic  choir,  had  the  immortal  honour  of 
giving  it  utterance  for  them  all — 


236  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

"  THOU  ART   THE    CHRIST,    THE    SON   OF   THE    LlVING   GOD  !  " 

Such  an  answer  from  the  chief  of  the  Apostles  atoned  by  its  fulness 
of  insight  and  certitude  of  conviction  for  the  defective  appreciation  of 
the  multitudes.  It  showed  that  at  last  the  great  mystery  was  revealed 
which  had  been  hidden  from  the  ages  and  the  generations.  The 
Apostles  at  least  had  not  only  recognised  in  Jesus  of  Nazareth  the 
promised  Messiah  of  their  nation,  but  it  had  been  revealed  to  them  by 
the  special  grace  of  God  that  that  Messiah  was  not  only  what  the  Jews 
expected,  a  Prince,  and  a  Ruler,  and  a  Son  of  David,  but  was  more 
than  this,  even  the  Son  of  the  living  God. 

With  awful  solemnity  did  the  Saviour  ratify  that  great  confession. 
"Jesus  answered  and  said  unto  him,  Blessed  art  thou,  Simon,  son  of 
Jonas :  for  flesh  and  blood  hath  not  revealed  it  unto  thee,  but  nay 
Father  which  is  in  heaven.  And  I  say  unto  thee,  that  thou  art 
Peter  (Petros),  and  on  this  rock  (petra)  I  will  build  my  Church, 
and  the  gates  of  hell  shall  not  prevail  against  it.  And  I  will  give 
unto  thee  the  keys  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven ;  and  whatsoever  thou 
shalt  bind  on  earth  shall  be  bound  in  heaven,  and  whatsoever  thou 
shalt  loose  on  earth  shall  be  loosed  in  heaven." 

Never  did  even  the  lips  of  Jesus  utter  more  memorable  words.  It 
was  His  own  testimony  of  Himself.  It  was  the  promise  that  they  who 
can  acknowledge  it  are  blessed.  It  was  the  revealed  fact  that  they 
only  can  acknowledge  it  who  are  led  thereto  by  the  Spirit  of  God.  It 
told  mankind  for  ever  that  not  by  earthly  criticisms,  but  only  by 
heavenly  grace,  can  the  full  knowledge  of  that  truth  be  obtained.  It 
was  the  laying  of  the  corner-stone  of  the  CHURCH  OF  CHRIST,  and  the 
earliest  occasion  on  which  was  uttered  that  memorable  word,  thereafter 
to  be  so  intimately  blended  with  the  history  of  the  world.  It  was  the 
promise  that  that  Church  founded  on  the  rock  of  inspired  confession 
should  remain  un conquered  by  all  the  powers  of  hell.  It  was  the  con- 
ferring upon  that  Church,  in  the  person  of  its  typical  representative, 
the  power  to  open  and  shut,  to  bind  and  loose,  and  the  promise  that  the 
power  faithfully  exercised  on  earth  should  be  finally  ratified  in  heaven. 

"  Tute  haec  omnia  dicuntur,"  says  the  great  Bengel,  "  nam  quid  ad 
Bomam  ?  "  "  all  these  statements  are  made  with  safety ;  for  what  have 
they  to  do  with  Borne  ?  "  Let  him  who  will  wade  through  all  the  con- 
troversy necessitated  by  the  memorable  perversions  of  this  memorable 
text,  which  runs  as  an  inscription  round  the  interior  of  the  great  dome 
of  St.  Peter's.  Bat  little  force  is  needed  to  overthrow  the  strange 
inverted  pyramids  of  argument  which  have  been  built  upon  it.  Were 


THE    LIFE   OF   CHBIST.  237 

it  not  a  matter  of  history,  it  would  have  been  deemed  incredible  that 
on  so  baseless  a  foundation  should  have  been  rested  the  fantastic 
claim  that  abnormal  power  should  be  conceded  to  the  bishops  of  a 
Church  which  almost  certainly  St.  Peter  did  not  found,  and  in  a  city 
in  which  there  is  no  indisputable  proof  that  he  ever  set  his  foot. 
The  immense  arrogancies  of  sacerdotalism ;  the  disgraceful  abuses  of 
the  confessional ;  the  imaginary  power  of  absolving  from  oaths ;  the 
ambitious  assumption  of  a  right  to  crush  and  control  the  civil  power  ; 
the  extravagant  usurpation  of  infallibility  in  wielding  the  dangerous 
weapons  of  anathema  and  excommunication ;  the  colossal  tyrannies  of 
the  Popedom,  and  the  detestable  cruelties  of  the  Inquisition — all  these 
abominations  are,  we  may  hope,  henceforth  and  for  ever,  things  of  the 
past.  But  the  Church  of  Christ  remains,  of  which  Peter  was  a  chief 
foundation,  a  living  stone.  The  powers  of  hell  have  not  prevailed 
against  it ;  it  still  has  a  commission  to  fling  wide  open  the  gates  of  the 
kingdom  of  heaven  ;  it  still  may  loose  us  from  idle  traditional  burdens 
and  meaningless  ceremonial  observances ;  it  still  may  bind  upon  our 
hearts  and  consciences  the  truths  of  revealed  religion  and  the  eternal 
obligations  of  the  Moral  Law. 

To  Peter  himself  the  great  promise  was  remarkably  fulfilled.  It 
was  he  who  converted  on  the  day  of  Pentecost  the  first  great  body  of 
Jews  who  adopted  the  Christian  faith ;  it  was  he  who  admitted  the 
earliest  Gentile  into  the  full  privileges  of  Christian  fellowship.  His 
confession  made  him  as  a  rock,  on  which  the  faith  of  many  was 
founded,  which  the  powers  of  Hades  might  shake,  but  over  which 
they  never  could  prevail.  But,  as  has  been  well  added  by  one  of  the 
deepest,  most  venerable,  and  most  learned  Fathers  of  the  ancient 
Church,  "  If  any  one  thus  confess,  when  flesh  and  blood  have  not 
revealed  it  unto  him,  but  our  Father  in  heaven,  he,  too,  shall  obtain 
the  promised  blessings ;  as  the  letter  of  the  Gospel  saith  indeed  to  the 
great  St.  Peter,  but  as  its  spirit  teacheth  to  every  man  who  hath 
become  like  what  that  great  Peter  was." 

It  may  be  said  that,  from  that  time  forth,  the  Saviour  might 
regard  one  great  portion  of  His  work  on  earth  as  having  been  accom- 
plished. His  Apostles  were  now  convinced  of  the  mystery  of  His 
being ;  the  foundations  were  laid  on  which,  with  Himself  as  the  chief 
corner-stone,  the  whole  vast  edifice  was  to  be  hereafter  built. 

But  He  forbade  them  to  reveal  this  truth  as  yet.  The  time  for  such 
preaching  had  not  yet  come.  They  were  yet  wholly  ignorant  of  the  true 
method  of  His  manifestation.  They  were  yet  too  unconfirmed  in  faith 


238  THE   LIFE    OF   CHEIST. 

even  to  remain  true  to  Him  in  His  hour  of  utmost  need.  As  yet  He 
would  be  known  as  the  Christ  to  those  only  whose  spiritual  insight  could 
see  Him  immediately  in  His  life  and  in  His  works.  As  yet  He  would 
neither  strive  nor  cry,  nor  should  His  voice  be  heard  in  the  streets. 
When  their  own  faith  was  confirmed  beyond  all  wavering  by  the 
mighty  fact  of  His  resurrection,  when  their  hearts  had  been  filled  with 
the  new  Shechinah  of  God's  Holy  Spirit,  and  their  brows,  with  final 
consecration,  had  been  mitred  with  Pentecostal  flame,  then,  but  not 
till  then,  would  the  hour  have  come  for  them  to  go  forth  and  teach  all 
nations  that  Jesus  was  indeed  the  Christ,  the  Son  of  the  Living  God. 

But  although  they  now  knew  Him,  they  knew  nothing  as  yet  of  the 
way  in  which  it  was  His  will  to  carry  out  His  divine  purposes.  It 
was  time  that  they  should  yet  farther  be  prepared ;  it  was  time  that 
they  should  learn  that,  King  though  He  was,  His  kingdom  was  not  of 
this  world ;  it  was  time  that  all  idle  earthly  hopes  of  splendour  and 
advancement  in  the  Messianic  kingdom  should  be  quenched  in  them 
for  ever,  and  that  they  should  know  that  the  kingdom  of  God  is  not 
meat  and  drink,  but  righteousness  and  peace,  and  joy  in  believing. 

Therefore  He  began,  calmly  and  deliberately,  to  reveal  to  them  His 
intended  journey  to  Jerusalem,  His  rejection  by  the  leaders  of  His 
nation,  the  anguish  and  insult  that  awaited  Him,  His  violent  death, 
His  resurrection  on  the  third  day.  He  had,  indeed,  on  previous 
occasions  given  them  divers  and  distant  intimations  of  these  approach- 
ing sufferings,  but  now  for  the  first  time  He  dwelt  on  them  distinctly, 
and  that  with  full  freedom  of  speech.  Yet  even  now  He  did  not  reveal 
in  its  entire  awfulness  the  manner  of  His  approaching  death.  He 
made  known  unto  them,  indeed,  that  He  should  be  rejected  by  the 
elders  and  chief  priests  and  scribes — by  all  the  authorities,  and  dignities, 
and  sanctities  of  the  nation — but  not  that  He  should  be  delivered  to 
the  Gentiles.  He  warned  them  that  He  should  be  killed,  but  He 
reserved  till  the  time  of  His  last  journey  to  Jerusalem  the  horrible  fact 
that  He  should  be  crucified.  He  thus  revealed  to  them  the  future 
only  as  they  were  best  able  to  bear  it,  and  even  then,  to  console  their 
anguish  and  to  support  their  faith,  He  told  them  quite  distinctly,  that 
on  the  third  day  He  should  rise  again. 

Bat  the  human  mind  has  a  singular  capacity  for  rejecting  that 
which  it  cannot  comprehend — for  ignoring  and  forgetting  all  that  does 
not  fall  within  the  range  of  its  previous  conceptions.  The  Apostles, 
ever  faithful  and  ever  simple  in  their  testimony,  never  conceal  from  us 
their  dulness  of  spiritual  insight,  nor  the  dominance  of  Judaic  pre- 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHEIST.  231) 

conceptions  over  their  minds.  They  themselves  confess  to  us  how  some- 
times they  took  the  literal  for  the  figurative,  and  sometimes  the  figurative 
for  the  literal.  They  heard  the  announcement,  but  they  did  not  realise  it. 
"  They  understood  not  this  saying,  and  it  was  hid  from  them,  and  they 
perceived  it  not."  Now  as  on  so  many  other  occasions  a  supernatural 
awe  was  upon  them,  "  and  they  feared  to  ask  Him."  The  prediction 
of  His  end  was  so  completely  alien  from  their  whole  habit  of  thought, 
that  they  would  only  put  it  aside  as  irrelevant  and  unintelligible — 
some  mystery  which  they  could  not  fathom  ;  and  as  regards  the  resur- 
rection, when  it  was  again  prophesied  to  the  most  spiritual  among 
them  all,  they  could  only  question  among  one  another  what  the  rising 
from  the  dead  should  mean. 

But  Peter,  in  his  impetuosity,  thought  that  he  understood,  and 
thought  that  he  could  prevent;  and  so  he  interrupted  those  solemn 
utterances  by  his  ignorant  and  presumptuous  zeal.  The  sense  that  it  had 
been  given  to  him  to  perceive  and  utter  a  new  and  mighty  truth,  together 
with  the  splendid  eulogium  and  promise  which  he  had  just  received, 
combined  to  inflate  his  intellect  and  misguide  his  heart ;  and  taking 
Jesus  by  the  hand  or  by  the  robe,  he  led  Him  a  step  or  two  aside  from 
the  disciples,  and  began  to  advise,  to  instruct,  to  rebuke  his  Lord. 
"God  forbid,"  he  said;  "this  shall  certainly  not  happen  to  thee." 
With  a  flash  of  sudden  indignation  our  Lord  rebuked  his  worldliness 
and  presumption.  Turning  away  from  him,  fixing  His  eyes  on  the 
other  disciples,  and  speaking  in  the  hearing  of  them  all — for  it  was  fit 
that  they  who  had  heard  the  words  of  vast  promise  should  hear  also 
the  crushing  rebuke — He  exclaimed,  "  Get  thee  behind  me,  Satan ! 
thou  art  a  stumbling-block  unto  me;  for  thy  thoughts  are,  not  the 
thoughts  of  God  but  of  men."  This  thy  mere  carnal  and  human  view 
— this  attempt  to  dissuade  me  from  my  "  baptism  of  death  " — is  a  sin 
against  the  purposes  of  God.  Peter  was  to  learn — would  that  the 
Church  which  professes  to  have  inherited  from  him  its  exclusive  and 
superhuman  claims  had  also  learnt  in  time ! — that  he  was  far  indeed 
from  being  infallible — that  he  was  capable  of  falling,  aye,  and  with 
scarcely  a  moment's  intermission,  from  heights  of  divine  insight  into 
depths  of  most  earthly  folly. 

"  Get  thee  behind  me,  Satan  !  " — the  very  words  which  He  had  used 
to  the  tempter  in  the  wilderness.  The  rebuke  was  strong,  yet  to  our 
cars  it  probably  conveys  a  meaning  far  more  violent  than  it  would  have 
done  to  the  ears  that  heard  it.  The  word  Satan  means  no  more  than 
"  adversary,"  and,  as  in  many  passages  of  the  Old  Testament,  is  so  far 


240  THE  LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

from  meaning  the  great  Adversary  of  mankind,  that  it  is  even  applied 
to  opposing  angels.  The  word,  in  fact,  was  among  the  Jews,  as  in  the 
East  generally,  and  to  this  day,  a  very  common  one  for  anything  bold, 
powerful,  dangerous — for  every  secret  opponent  or  open  enemy.  But 
its  special  applicability  in  this  instance  rose  from  the  fact  that  Peter 
was  in  truth  adopting  the  very  line  of  argument  which  the  Tempter 
himself  had  adopted  in  the  wilderness.  And  in  calling  Peter  an 
offence  (a-fcdv^akov),  Jesus  probably  again  alluded  to  his  name,  and 
compared  him  to  a  stone  in  the  path  over  which  the  wayfarer  stumbles. 
The  comparison  must  have  sunk  deeply  into  the  Apostle's  mind,  for  he 
too  in  his  Epistle  warns  his  readers  against  some  to  whom,  because 
they  believe  not,  the  Headstone  of  the  Corner  became  "  a  stone  of 
stumbling  and  a  rock  of  offence  "  (jrerpa  (TKav$d\ov,  1  Pet.  ii.  8). 

But  having  thus  warned  and  rebuked  the  ignorant  affection  of 
unspiritual  effeminacy  in  His  presumptuous  Apostle,  the  Lord 
graciously  made  the  incident  an  occasion  for  some  of  His  deepest 
teaching,  which  He  not  only  addressed  to  His  disciples,  but  to  all. 
We  learn  quite  incidentally  from  St.  Mark,  that  even  in  these  remote 
regions,  His  footsteps  were  sometimes  followed  by  attendant  crowds, 
who  usually  walked  at  a  little  distance  from  Him  and  His 
disciples,  but  were  sometimes  called  to  Him  to  hear  the  gracious 
words  which  proceeded  out  of  His  mouth.  And  alike  they 
and  His  disciples  were  as  yet  infected  with  the  false  notions 
which  had  inspired  the  impetuous  interference  of  Peter.  To 
them,  therefore,  He  addressed  the  words  which  have  taught  us 
for  ever  that  the  essence  of  all  highest  duty,  the  meaning  of  all 
truest  life — alike  the  most  acceptable  service  to  God,  and  the  most 
ennobling  example  to  men — is  involved  in  the  law  of  self-sacrifice.  It 
was  on  this  occasion  that  He  spoke  those  few  words  which  have 
produced  so  infinite  an  effect  on  the  conscience  of  mankind.  "  What 
is  a  man  profited,  if  he  shall  gain  the  whole  world,  and  lose  his  own 
soul?  or  what  shall  a  man  give  in  exchange  for  his  soul?"  And  then, 
after  warning  them  that  He  should  Himself  be  judged,  He  consoled 
them  under  this  shock  of  unexpected  revelation  by  the  assurance  that 
there  were  some  standing  there  who  should  not  taste  of  death  till  they 
had  seen  the  Son  of  Man  coming  in  His  kingdom.  If,  as  all  Scripture 
shows,  "  the  kingdom  of  the  Son  of  Man "  be  understood  in  a 
sense  primarily  spiritual,  then  there  can  be  no  difficulty  in  under- 
standing this  prophecy  in  the  sense  that,  ere  all  of  them  passed 
away,  the  foundations  of  that  kingdom  should  have  been  established 


THE   LIFE    OP  CHRIST.  241 

for  ever  in  the  abolition  of  the  old  and  the  establishment  of  the 
new  dispensation.  Three  of  them  were  immediately  to  see  Him 
transfigured ;  all  but  one  were  to  be  witnesses  of  His  resurrection ; 
one  at  least — the  beloved  disciple — was  to  survive  that  capture  of 
Jerusalem  and  destruction  of  the  Temple  which  were  to  render 
impossible  any  literal  fulfilment  of  the  Mosaic  law.  And  the  pro- 
phecy may  have  deeper  meanings  yet  than  these — meanings  still 
more  real  because  they  are  still  more  wholly  spiritual.  "If  we 
wish  not  to  fear  death,"  says  St.  Ambrose,  "  let  us  stand  where 
Christ  is ;  Christ  is  your  Life ;  He  is  the  very  Life  which  cannot 
die." 


CHAPTER   XXXVI. 

THE   TRANSFIGURATION. 

of  the  Evangelists  tell  us  about  the  week  which  followed  this 
memorable  event.  They  tell  us  only  that  "after  six  days"  He  took 
with  Him  the  three  dearest  and  most  enlightened  of  His  disciples,  and 
went  with  them — the  expression  implies  a  certain  solemnity  of  expec- 
tation— up  a  lofty  mountain,  or,  as  St.  Luke  calls  it,  simply  "  the 
mountain."  «• 

The  supposition  that  the  mountain  intended  was  Mount  Tabor  has 
been  engrained  for  centuries  in  the  tradition  of  the  Christian  Church ; 
and  three  churches  and  a  monastery  erected  before  the  close  of  the 
sixth  century  attest  the  unhesitating  acceptance  of  this  belief.  Yet  it 
is  almost  certain  that  Tabor  was  not  the  scene  of  that  great  epiphany. 
The  rounded  summit  of  that  picturesque  and  wood-crowned  hill,  which 
forms  so  fine  a  feature  in  the  landscape,  as  the  traveller  approaches 
the  northern  limit  of  the  plain  of  Esdraelon,  had  probably  from  time 
immemorial  been  a  fortified  and  inhabited  spot,  and  less  than  thirty 
years  after  this  time,  Josephus,  on  this  very  mountain,  strengthened 
the  existing  fortress  of  Itaburion.  This,  therefore,  was  not  a  spot  to 
which  Jesus  could  have  taken  the  three  Apostles  "apart  by  them- 
selves." Nor,  again,  is  there  the  slightest  intimation  that  the  six 
intervening  days  had  been  spent  in  travelling  southwards  from 
Ciusarea  Philippi,  the  place  last  mentioned ;  on  the  contrary,  it  is 


242  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

distinctly  intimated  by  St.  Mark  (ix.  30),  that  Jesus  did  not  "pass 
through  Galilee"  (in  which  Mount  Tabor  is  situated)  till  after  the 
events  here  narrated.  Nor  again  does  the  comparatively  insignificant 
hill  Paneum,  which  is  close  by  Caesarea  Philippi,  fulfil  the  require- 
ments of  the  narrative.  It  is,  therefore,  much  more  natural  to  sup- 
pose that  our  Lord,  anxious  to  traverse  the  Holy  Land  of  His  birth  to 
its  northern  limit,  journeyed  slowly  forward  till  He  reached  the  lower 
slopes  of  that  splendid  snow-clad  mountain,  whose  glittering  mass, 
visible  even  as  far  southward  as  the  Dead  Sea,  magnificently  closes 
the  northern  frontier  of  Palestine — the  Mount  Hermon  of  Jewish 
poetry.  Its  very  name  means  "  the  mountain,"  and  the  scene  which 
it  witnessed  would  well  suffice  to  procure  for  it  the  distinction  of 
being  the  only  mountain  to  which  in  Scripture  is  attached  the  epithet 
"  holy."  On  those  dewy  pasturages,  cool  and  fresh  with  the  breath 
of  the  snow-clad  heights  above  them,  and  offering  that  noble  solitude, 
among  the  grandest  scenes  of  Nature,  which  He  desired  as  the  refresh- 
ment of  His  soul  for  the  mighty  struggle  which  was  now  so  soon  to 
come,  Jesus  would  find  many  a  spot  where  He  could  kneel  with  His 
disciples  absorbed  in  silent  prayer. 

And  the  coolness  and  solitude  would  be  still  more  delicious  to  the 
weariness  of  the  Man  of  Sorrows  after  the  burning  heat  of  the  Eastern 
day  and  the  incessant  publicity  which,  even  in  these  remoter  regions, 
thronged  his  steps.  It  was  the  evening  hour  when  He  ascended,  and 
as  He  climbed  the  hill-slope  with  those  three  chosen  witnesses — "  the 
Sons  of  Thunder  and  the  Man  of  Rock  " — doubtless  a  solemn  gladness 
dilated  His  whole  soul ;  a  sense  not  only  of  the  heavenly  calm  which 
that  solitary  communion  with  His  Heavenly  Father  would  breathe 
upon  the  spirit,  but  still  more  than  this,  a  sense  that  He  would  be 
supported  for  the  coming  hour  by  ministrations  not  of  earth,  and 
illuminated  with  a  light  which  needed  no  aid  from  sun  or  moon  or 
stars.  He  went  up  to  be  prepared  for  death,  and  He  took  His  three 
Apostles  with  Him  that,  haply,  having  seen  His  glory — the  glory  of 
the  only  Begotten  of  the  Father,  full  of  grace  and  truth — their  hearts 
might  be  fortified,  their  faith  strengthened,  to  gaze  unshaken  on  the 
shameful  insults  and  unspeakable  humiliation  of  the  cross. 

There,  then,  He  knelt  and  prayed,  and  as  He  prayed  He  was 
elevated  far  above  the  toil  and  misery  of  the  world  which  had  rejected 
Him.  He  was  transfigured  before  them,  and  His  countenance  shone 
as  the  sun,  and  His  garments  became  white  as  the  dazzling  snow-fields 
above  them.  He  was  enwrapped  in  such  an  aureole  of  glistering 


THE    LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  243 

brilliance — His  whole  presence  breathed  so  divine  a  radiance — that 
the  light,  the  snow,  the  lightning  are  the  only  things  to  which  the 
Evangelist  can  compare  that  celestial  lustre.  And,  lo  !  two  figures 
were  by  His  side.  "  When,  in  the  desert,  He  was  girding  Himself  for 
the  work  of  life,  angels  of  life  came  and  ministered  unto  Him  ;  now,  in 
the  fair  world,  when  He  is  girding  Himself  for  the  work  of  death,  the 
ministrants  come  to  Him  from  the  grave — but  from  the  grave  con- 
quered— one  from  that  tomb  under  Abarim,  which  His  own  hand  had 
sealed  long  ago ;  the  other  from  the  rest  into  which  He  had  entered 
without  seeing  corruption.  There  stood  by  Him  Moses  and  Elias,  and 
spake  of  His  decease.  And  when  the  prayer  is  ended,  the  task 
accepted,  then  first  since  the  star  paused  over  Him  at  Bethlehem, 
the  full  glory  falls  upon  Him  from  heaven,  and  the  testimony  is 
borne  to  His  everlasting  sonship  and  power — '  Hear  ye  Him.'  " 

It  is  clear,  from  the  fuller  narrative  of  St.  Luke,  that  the  three 
Apostles  did  not  witness  the  beginning  of  this  marvellous  transfigu- 
ration. An  Oriental,  when  his  prayers  are  over,  wraps  himself  in  his 
abba,  and,  lying  down  on  the  grass  in  the  open  air,  sinks  in  a  moment 
into  profound  sleep.  And  the  Apostles,  as  afterwards  they  slept  at 
Gethsemane,  so  now  they  slept  on  Hermon^  They  were  heavy, 
"weighed  down"  with  sleep,  when  suddenly  starting  into  full 
wakefulness  of  spirit,  they  saw  and  heard. 

In  the  darkness  of  the  night,  shedding  an  intense  gleam  over  the 
mountain  herbage,  shone  the  glorified  form  of  their  Lord.  Beside  Him, 
in  the  same  flood  of  golden  glory,  were  two  awful  shapes,  which  they 
knew  or  heard  to  be  Moses  and  Elijah.  And  the  Three  spake  together, 
in  the  stillness,  of  that  coming  decease  at  Jerusalem,  about  which  they 
had  just  been  forewarned  by  Christ. 

And  as  the  splendid  vision  began"  to  fade — as  the  majestic  visitants 
were  about  to  be  separated  from  their  Lord,  as  their  Lord  Himself 
passed  with  them  into  the  overshadowing  brightness — Peter,  anxious 
to  delay  their  presence,  amazed,  startled,  transported,  not  knowing 
what  he  said — not  knowing  that  Calvary  would  be  a  spectacle 
infinitely  more  transcendent  than  Hermon — not  knowing  that  the  Law 
and  the  Prophets  were  now  fulfilled — not  fully  knowing  that  his  Lord 
was  unspeakably  greater  than  the  Prophet  of  Sinai  and  the  Avenger 
of  Carmel — exclaimed,  "  Rabbi,  it  is  best  for  us  to  be  here ;  and  let  us 
make  three  tabernacles,  one  for  thee,  and  one  for  Moses,  and  one  for 
Elias."  Jesus  might  have  smiled  at  the  naive  proposal  of  the  eager 
Apostle,  that  they  six  should  dwell  for  ever  in  little  succoth  of  wattled 

B  2 


244  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

boughs  on  the  slopes  of  Hermon.  Bat  it  was  not  for  Peter  to 
construct  the  universe  for  his  personal  satisfaction.  He  had  to  learn 
the  meaning  of  Calvary  no  less  than  that  of  Hermon.  Not  in  cloud 
of  glory  or  chariot  of  fire  was  Jesus  to  pass  away  from  them,  but  with 
arms  outstretched  in  agony  upon  the  accursed  tree ;  not  between 
Moses  and  Elias,  but  between  two  thieves,  who  "  were  crucified  with 
Him,  on  either  side  one." 

No  answer  was  vouchsafed  to  his  wild  and  dreamy  words ;  but, 
even  as  he  spake,  a  cloud — not  a  cloud  of  thick  darkness  as  at  Sinai, 
but  a  cloud  of  light,  a  Shechinah  of  radiance — overshadowed  them, 
and  a  voice  from  out  of  it  uttered,  "  This  is  my  beloved  Son ;  hear 
Him."  They  fell  prostrate,  and  hid  their  faces  on  the  grass.  And  as 
— -awaking  from  the  overwhelming  shock  of  that  awful  voice,  of  that 
enfolding  Light — they  raised  their  eyes  and  gazed  suddenly  all  around 
them,  they  found  that  all  was  over.  The  bright  cloud  had  vanished. 
The  lightning-like  gleams  of  shining  countenances  and  dazzling  robes 
had  passed  away;  they  were  alone  with  Jesus,  and  only  the  stars 
rained  their  quiet  lustre  on  the  mountain  slopes. 

At  first  they  were  afraid  to  rise  or  stir,  but  Jesus,  their  Master — as 
they  had  seen  Him  before  He  knelt  in  prayer,  came  to  them,  touched 
them — said,  "  Arise,  and  be  not  afraid." 

And  so  the  day  dawned  on  Hermon,  and  they  descended  the  hill ; 
and  as  they  descended,  He  bade  them  tell  no  man  until  He  had  risen 
from  the  dead.  The  vision  was  for  them ;  it  was  to  be  pondered  over 
by  them  in  the  depths  of  their  own  hearts  in  self-denying  reticence  ; 
to  announce  it  to  their  fellow-disciples  might  only  awake  their  jealousy 
and  their  own  self-satisfaction  ;  until  the  resurrection  it  would  add 
nothing  to  the  faith  of  others,  and  might  only  confuse  their  conceptions 
of  what  was  to  be  His  work  on  earth.  They  kept  Christ's  command, 
but  they  could  not  attach  any  meaning  to  this  allusion.  They  could 
only  ask  each  other,  or  muse  in  silence,  what  this  resurrection  from 
the  dead  could  mean.  And  another  serious  question  weighed  upon  their 
spirits.  They  had  seen  Elias.  They  now  knew  more  fully  than  ever 
that  their  Lord  was  indeed  the  Christ.  Yet  "  how  say  the  Scribes  " — 
and  had  not  the  Scribes  the  prophecy  of  Malachi  in  their  favour  ? — 
"  that  Elias  must  first  come  and  restore  all  things  ?  "  And  then  our 
Lord  gently  led  them  to  see  that  Elias  indeed  had  come,  and  had  not 
been  recognised,  and  had  received  at  the  hand  of  his  nation  the  same 
fate  which  was  soon  to  happen  to  him  whom  he  announced.  Then 
understood  they  that  He  spake  to  them  of  John  the  Baptist. 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  245 

CHAPTER    XXXVII. 

THE    DEMONIAC   BOY. 

THE  imagination  of  all  readers  of  the  Gospels  has  been  struck  by  tho 
contrast — a  contrast  seized  and  immortalised  for  ever  in  the  great 
picture  of  Raphael — between  the  peace,  the  glory,  the  heavenly  com- 
munion on  the  mountain  heights,  and  the  confusion,  the  rage,  the 
unbelief,  the  agony  which  marked  the  first  scene  that  met  the  eyes  of 
Jesus  and  His  Apostles  on  their  descent  to  the  low  levels  of  human 
life. 

For  in  their  absence  an  event  had  occurred  which  filled  the  other 
disciples  with  agitation  and  alarm.  They  saw  a  crowd  assembled  and 
Scribes  among  them,  who  with  disputes  and  victorious  inuendoes  were 
pressing  hard  upon  the  diminished  band  of  Christ's  chosen  friends. 

Suddenly  at  this  crisis  the  multitude  caught  sight  of  Jesus.  Some- 
thing about  His  appearance,  some  unusual  majesty,  some  lingering 
radiance,  filled  them  with  amazement,  and  they  ran  up  to  Him  with 
salutations.  "  What  is  your  dispute  with  them  ?"  He  sternly  asked  of 
the  Scribes.  But  the  Scribes  were  too  much  abashed,  the  disciples 
were  too  self-conscious  of  their  faithlessness  and  failure,  to  venture  on 
any  reply.  Then  out  of  the  crowd  struggled  a  man,  who,  kneeling 
before  Jesus,  cried  out,  in  a  loud  voice,  that  he  was  the  father  of  an 
only  son  whose  demoniac  possession  was  shown  by  epilepsy,  in  its  most 
raging  symptoms,  accompanied  by  dumbness,  atrophy,  and  a  suicidal 
mania.  He  had  brought  the  miserable  sufferer  to  the  disciples  to  cast 
out  the  evil  spirit,  but  their  failure  had  occasioned  the  taunts  of  the 
Scribes. 

The  whole  scene  grieved  Jesus  to  the  heart.  "  0  faithless  and  per- 
verse generation,"  He  exclaimed,  "how  long  shall  I  be  with  you?  how 
long  shall  I  suffer  you  ? "  This  cry  of  indignation  seemed  meant 
for  all — for  the  merely  curious  multitude,  for  the  malicious  Scribes, 
for  the  half- believing  and  faltering  disciples.  "  Bring  him  hither 
to  me." 

The  poor  boy  was  brought,  and  no  sooner  had  his  eye  fallen  on 
Jesus,  than  he  was  seized  with  another  paroxysm  of  his  malady.  He 
fell  on  the  ground  in  violent  convulsions,  and  rolled  there  with  foaming 
lips.  It  was  the  most  deadly  and  intense  form  of  epileptic  lunacy  on 
which  our  Lord  had  ever  been  called  to  take  compassion. 


246  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

He  paused  before  He  acted.  He  would  impress  the  scene  in  all  its 
horror  on  the  thronging  multitude,  that  they  might  understand  that 
the  failure  was  not  of  Him.  He  would  at  the  same  time  invoke,  educe, 
confirm  the  wavering  faith  of  the  agonised  suppliant. 

"  How  long  has  this  happened  to  him  ?  " 

"From  childhood  :  and  often  hath  it  flung  him  both  into  fire  and 
into  water  to  destroy  him ;  but  if  at  all  tliou  canst,  take  pity  on  us  and 
help  us." 

"  If  tliou  canst  ?  "  answered  Jesus — giving  him  back  his  own  word 
— "all  things  are  possible  to  him  that  believeth." 

And  then  the  poor  hapless  father  broke  out  into  that  cry,  uttered 
by  so  many  millions  since,  and  so  deeply  applicable  to  an  age  which, 
like  our  own,  has  been  described  as  "  destitute  of  faith,  yet  terrified  at 
scepticism  " — "  Lord,  I  believe  ;  help  thou  mine  unbelief" 

Meanwhile,  during  this  short  colloquy,  the  crowd  had  been  gather- 
ing more  and  more,  and  Jesus,  turning  to  the  sufferer,  said,  "  Dumb 
and  deaf  spirit,  I  charge  thee,  come  out  of  him,  and  enter  no  more  into 
.him."  A  yet  wilder  cry,  a  yet  more  fearful  convulsion  followed  His 
words,  and  then  the  boy  lay  on  the  ground,  no  longer  wallowing  and 
foaming,  but  still  as  death.  Some  said,  "  He  is  dead."  But  Jesus 
took  him  by  the  hand,  and,  amid  the  amazed  exclamations  of  the  mul- 
titude, restored  him  to  his  father,  calm  and  cured. 

Jesus  had  previously  given  to  His  disciples  the  power  of  casting  out 
devils,  and  this  power  was  even  exercised  in  His  name  by  some  who 
were  not  among  His  professed  disciples.  Nor  had  they  ever  failed  be- 
fore. It  was  therefore  natural  that  they  should  take  the  first  private 
opportunity  to  ask  Him  the  cause  of  their  discomfiture.  He  told  them 
frankly  that  it  was  because  of  their  unbelief.  It  may  be  that  the 
sense  of  His  absence  weakened  them ;  it  may  be  that  they  felt  less 
able  to  cope  with  difficulties  while  Peter  and  the  sons  of  Zebedee  were 
also  away  from  them ;  it  may  be,  too,  that  the  sad  prophecy  of  his 
rejection  and  death  had  worked  with  sinister  effect  on  the  minds  of  the 
weakest  of  them.  But  at  any  rate,  He  took  this  opportunity  to  teach 
them  two  great  lessons :  the  one,  that  there  are  forms  of  spiritual, 
physical,  and  moral  evil  so  intense  and  so  inveterate,  that  they  can 
only  be  exorcised  by  prayer,  united  to  that  self-control  and  self-denial 
of  which  fasting  is  the  most  effectual  and  striking  symbol ;  the  other, 
that  to  a  perfect  faith  all  things  are  possible.  Faith,  like  a  grain  of 
mustard-seed,  could  even  say  to  Hermon  itself,  "  Be  thou  removed,  and 
cast  into  the  waves  of  the  Great  Sea,  and  it  should  obey." 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  247 

Jesus  had  now  wandered  to  the  utmost  northern  limit  of  the  Holy 
Land,  and  He  began  to  turn  His  steps  homewards.  We  see  from  St. 
Mark  that  His  return  was  designedly  secret  and  secluded,  and  possibly 
not  along  the  high  roads,  but  rather  through  the  hills  and  valleys  of 
Upper  Galilee  to  the  westward  of  the  Jordan.  His  object  was  no 
longer  to  teach  the  multitudes  who  had  been  seduced  into  rejecting 
Him,  and  among  whom  He  could  hardly  appear  in  safety,  but  to  con- 
tinue that  other  and  even  more  essential  part  of  His  work,  which 
consisted  in  the  training  of  his  Apostles.  And  now  the  constant 
mbject  of  His  teaching  was  His  approaching  betrayal,  murder,  and 
resurrection.  But  He  spoke  to  dull  hearts;  in  their  deep-seated 
prejudice  they  ignored  His  clear  warnings,  in  their  faithless  timidity 
they  would  not  ask  for  further  enlightenment.  We  cannot  see  more 
strikingly  how  vast  was  the  change  which  the  resurrection  wrought  in 
them  than  by  observing  with  what  simple  truthfulness  they  record  the 
extent  and  inveteracy  of  their  own  shortcomings,  during  those  precious 
days  while  the  Lord  was  yet  among  them. 

The  one  thing  which  they  did  seem  to  realise  was  that  some  strange 
and  memorable  issue  of  Christ's  life,  accompanied  by  some  great 
development  of  the  Messianic  kingdom,  was  at  hand ;  and  this  un- 
happily produced  the  only  effect  in  them  which  it  should  not  have  pro- 
duced. Instead  of  stimulating  their  self-denial,  it  awoke  their 
ambition  ;  instead  of  confirming  their  love  and  humility,  it  stirred 
them  up  to  jealousy  and  pride.  On  the  road,  remembering,  perhap.-, 
the  preference  which  had  been  shown  at  Hermon  to  Peter  and  the  sons 
of  Zebedee — they  disputed  among  themselves,  "  Which  should  be  the 
greatest  ?" 

At  the  time  our  Lord  took  no  notice  of  the  dispute.  He  left  their 
own  consciences  to  work.  But  when  they  reached  Capernaum  and 
were  in  the  house,  then  He  asked  them,  "  What  they  had  been  dis- 
puting about  on  the  way  ?  "  Deep  shame  kept  them  silent,  and  that 
silence  was  the  most  eloquent  confession  of  their  sinful  ambitions. 
Then  He  sat  down,  and  taught  them  again,  as  He  had  done  so  often, 
that  he  who  would  be  first  must  be  last  of  all,  and  servant  of  all,  and 
that  the  road  to  honour  is  humility.  And  wishing  to  enforce  this 
lesson  by  a  symbol  of  exquisite  tenderness  and  beauty,  He  called  to 
Him  a  little  child,  and  set  it  in  the  midst,  and  then,  folding  it  in  his 
arms,  warned  them  that  unless  they  could  become  as  humble  as  that 
little  child,  they  could  not  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven.  They 
were  to  be  as  children  in  the  world ;  and  he  who  should  receive  even 


248  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

one  such  little  child  in  Christ's  name,  should  be  receiving  Him,  and 
the  Father  who  sent  Him. 

The  expression  "  in  my  name "  seems  to  have  suggested  to  St. 
John  a  sudden  question,  which  broke  the  thread  of  Christ's  dis- 
course. They  had  seen,  he  said,  a  man  who  was  casting  out  devils 
in  Christ's  name ;  but  since  the  man  was  not  one  of  them,  they  had 
forbidden  him.  Had  they  done  right  ? 

"  No,"  Jesus  answered ;  "  let  the  prohibition  be  removed."  He 
who  could  do  works  of  mercy  in  Christ's  name  could  not  lightly 
speak  evil  of  that  name.  He  who  was  not  against  them  was  with 
them.  Sometimes  indifference  is  opposition  ;  sometimes  neutrality  is 
aid. 

And  then,  gently  resuming  His  discourse — the  child  yet  nestling  in 
His  arms,  and  furnishing  the  text  for  His  remarks — He  warned  them 
of  the  awful  guilt  and  peril  of  offending,  of  tempting,  of  misleading,  of 
seducing  from  the  paths  of  innocence  and  righteousness,  of  teaching 
any  wicked  thing,  or  suggesting  any  wicked  thought  to  one  of  those 
little  ones,  whose  angels  see  the  face  of  His  Father  in  heaven.  Such 
wicked  men  and  seducers,  such  human  performers  of  the  devil's  work 
— addressing  them  in  words  of  more  bitter,  crushing  import  than 
any  which  He  ever  uttered — a  worse  fate,  He  said,  awaited  them, 
than  to  be  flung  with  the  heaviest  millstone  round  their  neck  into 
the  sea. 

And  He  goes  on  to  warn  them  that  no  sacrifice  could  be  too  great 
if  it  enabled  them  to  escape  any  possible  temptations  to  put  such 
stumbling-blocks  in  the  way  of  their  own  souls,  or  the  souls  of  others. 
Better  cut  off  the  right  hand,  and  enter  heaven  maimed — better  hew 
off  the  right  foot,  and  enter  heaven  halt — better  tear  out  the  right  eye, 
and  enter  heaven  blind — than  suffer  hand  or  foot  or  eye  to  be  the 
ministers  of  sins  which  should  feed  the  undying  worm  or  kindle  the 
quenchless  flame.  Better  be  drowned  in  this  world  with  a  millstone 
round  the  neck,  than  carry  that  moral  and  spiritual  millstone  of 
unresisted  temptation  which  can  drown  the  guilty  soul  in  the  fiery 
lake  of  alienation  and  despair.  For  just  as  salt  is  sprinkled  over  every 
sacrifice  for  its  purification,  so  must  every  soul  be  purged  by  fire  ;  by 
the  fire,  if  need  be,  of  the  severest  and  most  terrible  self-sacrifice. 
Let  this  refining,  purging,  purifying  fire  of  searching  self -judgment 
and  self-severity  be  theirs.  Let  not  this  salt  lose  its  savour,  nor  this 
fire  its  purifying  power.  "  Have  salt  in  yourselves,  and  be  at  peace 
with  one  another." 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  249 

Aud  thus,  at  once  to  confirm  the  duty  of  this  mutual  peace  which 
they  had  violated,  and  to  show  them  that,  however  deeply  rooted  be 
God's  anger  against  those  who  lead  others  astray,  they  must  never 
cherish  hatred  even  against  those  who  had  most  deeply  injured  them. 
He  taught  them  how,  first  by  private  expostulation,  then  if  necessary 
by  public  appeal,  at  once  most  gently  and  most  effectually  to  deal  with 
an  offending  brother.  Peter,  in  the  true  spirit  of  Judaic  formalism, 
wanted  a  specific  limit  to  the  number  of  times  when  forgiveness  should 
be  granted  ;  but  Jesus  taught  that  the  times  of  forgiveness  should  be 
practically  unlimited.  He  illustrated  that  teaching  by  the  beautiful 
parable  of  the  servant,  who,  having  been  forgiven  by  his  king  a  debt 
of  ten  thousand  talents,  immediately  afterwards  seized  his  fellow- 
servant  by  the  throat,  and  would  not  forgive  him  a  miserable  little 
debt  of  one  hundred  pence,  a  sum  1,250,000  times  as  small  as  that 
which  he  himself  had  been  forgiven.  The  child  whom  Jesus  had  held 
in  His  arms  might  have  understood  that  moral ;  yet  how  infinitely 
more  deep  must  its  meaning  be  to  us — who  have  been  trained  from 
childhood  in  the  knowledge  of  His  atoning  love — than  it  could  have 
been,  at  the  time  when  it  was  spoken,  to  even  a  Peter  or  a  John. 


CHAPTER    XXXYIH. 

A  BRIEF  REST  IN   CAPERNAUM. 

ONE  more  incident,  related  by  St.  Matthew  only,  marked  his  brief 
stay  on  this  occasion  in  Capernaum. 

From  time  immemorial  there  was  a  precedent  for  collecting,  at 
least  occasionally,  on  the  recurrence  of  every  census,  a  tax  of  "  half  a 
shekel,  after  the  shekel  of  the  sanctuary,"  of  every  Jew  who  had 
reached  the  age  of  twenty  years,  as  a  "  ransom  for  his  soul,"  unto  the 
Lord.  This  money  was  devoted  to  the  service  of  the  Temple,  and 
was  expended  on  the  purchase  of  the  sacrifices,  scapegoats,  red  heifers, 
incense,  shewbread,  and  other  expenses  of  the  Temple  service.  After 
the  return  from  the  captivity,  this  be  ah,  or  half-shekel,  became  a 
voluntary  annual  tax  of  a  third  of  a  shekel ;  but  at  some  subsequent 
period  it  had  again  returned  to  its  original  amount.  This  tax  was 


250  THE    LIFE   OF   CHBIST. 

paid  by  every  Jew  in  every  part  of  the  world,  whether  rich  or  poor ; 
and,  as  on  the  first  occasion  of  its  payment,  to  show  that  the  souls  of 
all  alike  are  equal  before  God,  "  the  rich  paid  no  more,  and  the  poor 
no  less."  It  produced  vast  sums  of  money,  which  were  conveyed  to 
Jerusalem  by  honourable  messengers. 

This  tax  was  only  so  far  compulsory  that  when  first  demanded, 
on  the  1st  of  Adar,  the  demand  was  made  quietly  and  civilly;  if  how- 
ever, it  had  not  been  paid  by  the  25th,  then  it  seems  that  the  collectors 
of  the  contribution  (tobhin  shekaliin)  might  take  a  security  for  it  from 
the  defaulter. 

Accordingly,  almost  immediately  upon  our  Lord's  return  to  Caper- 
naum, these  tobMn  sheJcaUm  came  to  St.  Peter,  and  asked  him,  quite 
civilly,  as  the  Rabbis  had  directed,  "  Does  not  your  master  pay  the 
didrachmas  ?  " 

The  question  suggests  two  difficulties — viz.,  Why  had  our  Lord 
not  been  asked  for  this  contribution  in  previous  years  ?  and  why  was 
it  now  demanded  in  autumn,  at  the  approach  of  the  Feast  of  Taber- 
nacles, instead  of  in  the  month  Adar,  some  six  months  earlier  ?  The 
answer  seems  to  be  that  priests  and  eminent  rabbis  were  regarded  as 
exempt  from  the  tax ;  that  our  Lord's  frequent  absence  from  Caper- 
naum caused  some  irregularity ;  and  that  it  was  permitted  to  pay 
arrears  some  time  afterwards. 

The  fact  that  the  collectors  inquired  of  St.  Peter  instead  of  asking 
Jesus  Himself,  is  another  of  the  very  numerous  indications  of  the  awe 
which  He  inspired  even  into  the  heart  of  His  bitterest  enemies :  as  in 
all  probability  the  fact  of  the  demand  being  made  at  all  shows  a  grow- 
ing desire  to  vex  His  life,  and  to  ignore  His  dignity.  But  Peter,  with 
his  usual  impetuous  readiness,  without  waiting,  as  he  should  have 
done,  to  consult  His  Master,  replied,  "  Yes." 

If  he  had  thought  a  moment  longer — if  he  had  known  a  little  more 
— if  he  had  even  recalled  his  own  great  confession  so  recently  given — 
his  answer  might  not  have  come  so  glibly.  This  money  was,  at  any 
rate,  in  its  original  significance,  a  redemption-money  for  the  soul  of 
each  man ;  and  how  could  the  Redeemer,  who  redeemed  all  souls  by 
the  ransom  of  His  life,  pay  this  money-ransom  for  his  own  ?  And  it 
was  a  tax  for  the  Temple  services.  How,  then,  could  it  be  due  from 
Him  whose  own  mortal  body  was  the  new  spiritual  Temple  of  the 
Living  God  ?  He  was  to  enter  the  vail  of  the  Holiest  with  the  ransom 
of  His  own  blood.  But  He  paid  what  He  did  not  owe,  to  save  us 
from  that  which  we  owed,  but  could  never  pay. 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  251 

Accordingly,  when  Peter  entered  the  house,  conscious,  perhaps,  bj 
this  time,  that  his  answer  had  been  premature — perhaps  also  conscious 
that  at  that  moment  there  were  no  means  of  meeting  even  this  small 
demand  upon  their  scanty  store — Jesus,  without  waiting  for  any  ex- 
pression of  his  embarrassment,  at  once  said  to  him,  "  What  thinkest 
thou,  Simon  ?  the  kings  of  the  earth,  from  whom  do  they  take  tolls 
and  taxes  ?  from  their  own  sons,  or  from  those  who  are  not  their 
children  ?  " 

There  could  be  but  one  answer — "From  those  who  are  not  their 
children." 

"  Then,"  said  Jesus,  "  the  sons  are  free."  I,  the  Son  of  the  Great 
King,  and  even  thou,  who  art  also  His  son,  though  in  a  different  way, 
are  not  bound  to  pay  this  tax.  If  we  pay  it,  the  payment  must  be  a 
matter,  not  of  positive  obligation,  as  the  Pharisees  have  lately  decided, 
but  of  free  and  cheerful  giving. 

There  is  something  beautiful  and  even  playful  in  this  gentle  way 
of  showing  to  the  impetuous  Apostle  the  dilemma  in  which  his  hasty 
answer  had  placed  his  Lord.  We  see  in  it,  as  Luther  says,  the  fine, 
friendly,  loving  intercourse  which  must  have  existed  between  Christ 
and  His  disciples.  It  seems,  at  the  same  time,  to  establish  the  eternal 
principle  that  religious  services  should  be  maintained  by  spontaneous 
generosity  and  an  innate  sense  of  duty  rather  than  in  consequence  of 
external  compulsion.  But  yet,  what  is  lawful  is  not  always  expedient, 
nor  is  there  anything  more  thoroughly  unchristian  than  the  violent 
maintenance  of  the  strict  letter  of  our  rights.  The  Christian  will 
always  love  rather  to  recede  from  something  of  his  privilege — to  take 
less  than  is  his  due.  And  so  He,  in  whose  steps  all  ought  to  walk, 
calmly  added,  "  Nevertheless,  lest  we  should  offend  them  "  (put  a  diffi- 
culty or  stumbling-block  in  their  way),  "  go  thou  to  the  sea  and  cast  a 
hook,  and  take  the  first  fish  that  cometh  up ;  and  opening  its  mouth 
thou  shalt  find  a  stater :  that  take  and  give  unto  them  for  Me  and  for 
thee."  In  the  very  act  of  submission,  as  Bengel  finely  says,  "His 
majesty  gleams  forth."  He  would  pay  the  contribution  to  avoid 
hurting  the  feelings  of  any,  and  especially  because  His  Apostle  had 
promised  it  in  His  behalf :  but  He  could  not  pay  it  in  an  ordinary  way, 
because  that  would  be  to  compromise  a  principle.  In  obeying  the  law 
of  charity,  and  of  self -surrender,  He  would  also  obey  the  laws  of 
dignity  and  truth.  "  He  pays  the  tribute,  therefore,"  says  Clarius, 
"but  taken  from  a  fish's  mouth,  that  His  majesty  may  be  recognised." 

When  Paulus,  with  somewhat  vulgar  jocosity,  calls  this  "  a  miracle 


252  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

for  half-a-crown,"  he  only  shows  his  own  entire  misconception  of  the 
fine  ethical  lessons  which  are  involved  in  the  narrative,  and  which  in 
this,  as  in  every  other  instance,  separate  our  Lord's  miracles  from  those 
of  the  Apocrypha.  Yet  I  agree  with  the  learned  and  thoughtful 
Olshausen  in  regarding  this  as  the  most  difficult  to  comprehend  of 
alt  the  Gospel  miracles — as  being  in  many  respects,  sui  generis — as  not 
falling  under  the  same  category  as  the  other  miracles  of  Christ.  "  It 
is  remarkable,"  says  Archbishop  Trench,  "  and  is  a  solitary  instance  of 
the  kind,  that  the  issue  of  this  bidding  is  not  told  us."  He  goes  on, 
indeed,  to  say  that  the  narrative  is  evidently  intended  to  be  miraculous, 
and  this  is  the  impression  which  it  has  almost  universally  left  on  the 
minds  of  those  who  read  it.  Yet  the  literal  translation  of  our  Lord's 
words  may  most  certainly  be,  "  on  opening  its  mouth,  thou  shalt  get, 
or  obtain,  a  stater ;  "  and  although  there  is  no  difficulty  whatever  in 
supposing  that  a  fish  may  have  swallowed  the  glittering  coin  as  it  was 
accidentally  dropped  into  the  water,  nor  should  I  feel  the  slightest  diffi- 
culty in  believing — as  I  hope  that  this  book,  from  its  first  page  to  its 
last,  will  show — that  a  miracle  might  have  been  wrought,  yet  the  pecu- 
liarities both  of  the  miracle  itself  and  of  the  manner  in  which  it  is  nar- 
rated, leave  in  my  mind  a  doubt  as  to  whether,  in  this  instance,  some 
essential  particular  may  not  have  been  either  omitted  or  left  unex- 
plained. 


CHAPTER   XXXIX. 

JESUS  AT  THE    FEAST   OF  TABERNACLES. 

IT  was  not  likely  that  Jesus  should  have  been  able  to  live  at  Capernaum 
without  the  fact  of  His  visit  being  known  to  some  of  the  inhabitants. 
But  it  is  clear  that  His  stay  in  the  town  was  very  brief,  and  that  it 
was  of  a  strictly  private  character.  The  discourse  and  the  incident 
mentioned  in  the  last  chapter  are  the  only  records  of  it  which  are 
left. 

But  it  was  now  autumn,  and  all  Galilee  was  in  the  stir  of  prepara- 
tion which  preceded  the  starting  of  the  annual  caravan  of  pilgrims  to 
one  of  the  three  great  yearly  feasts — the  Feast  of  Tabernacles.  That 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  253 

feast — the  Feast  of  Ingathering — was  intended  to  commemorate  the 
passage  of  the  Israelites  through  the  wilderness,  and  was  celebrated 
with  such  universal  joy,  that  both  Josephus  and  Philo  call  it  "the 
holiest  and  greatest  feast,"  and  it  was  known  among  the  Jews  as  "  the 
Feast "  pre-eminently.  It  was  kept  for  seven  consecutive  days,  from 
the  15th  to  the  21st  of  Tisri,  and  the  eighth  day  was  celebrated  by  a 
holy  convocation.  Daring  the  seven  days  the  Jews,  to  recall  their 
desert  wanderings,  lived  in  little  succoth,  or  booths  made  of  the  thickly- 
foliaged  boughs  of  olive,  and  palm,  and  pine,  and  myrtle,  and  each 
person  carried  in  his  hands  a  lulab,  consisting  of  palm-branches,  or 
willows  of  the  brook,  or  fruits  of  peach  and  citron.  During  the  week 
of  festivities  all  the  courses  of  priests  were  employed  in  turn ;  seventy 
bullocks  were  offered  in  sacrifice  for  the  seventy  nations  of  the  world  ; 
the  Law  was  daily  read,  and  on  each  day  the  Temple  trumpets  sounded 
twenty-one  times  an  inspiring  and  triumphant  blast.  The  joy  of  the 
occasion  was  doubtless  deepened  by  the  fact  that  the  feast  followed 
but  four  days  after  the  awful  and  comforting  ceremonies  of  the  Great 
Day  of  atonement,  in  which  a  solemn  expiation  was  made  for  the  sins 
of  all  the  people. 

On  the  eve  of  their  departure  for  this  feast  the  family  and  relations 
of  our  Lord — those  who  in  the  Gospels  are  invariably  called  His 
"brethren,"  and  some  of  whose  descendants  were  known  to  early 
tradition  as  the  Desposyni — came  to  Him  for  the  last  time  with  a  -well- 
meant  but  painful  and  presumptuous  interference.  They — like  the 
Pharisees,  and  like  the  multitude,  and  like  Peter — fancied  that  they 
knew  better  than  Jesus  Himself  that  line  of  conduct  which  would  best 
accomplish  His  work  and  hasten  the  universal  recognition  of  His 
claims.  They  came  to  Him  with  the  language  of  criticism,  of 
discontent,  almost  of  reproaches  and  complaints.  "  Why  this 
unreasonable  and  incomprehensible  secrecy  ?  it  contradicts  thy 
claims  ;  it  discourages  thy  followers.  Thou  hast  disciples  in  Judoea : 
go  thither,  and  let  them  too  see  Thy  works  which  Thou  doest  ?  If 
Thou  doest  these  things,  manifest  Thyself  to  the  world."  If  they 
could  use  such  language  to  their  Lord  and  Master — if  they  could,  as  it 
were,  thus  challenge  His  power  to  the  proof — it  is  but  too  plain  that 
their  knowledge  of  Him  was  so  narrow  and  inadequate  as  to  justify 
the  sad  parenthesis  of  the  beloved  Evangelist — "  for  not  even  His 
brethren  believed  on  Him."  He  was  a  stranger  unto  His  brethren, 
even  an  alien  unto  His  mother's  children. 

Such  dictation  on  their  part — the  bitter  fruit  of  impatient  vanity 


254  THE    LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

and  unspirifcual  ignorance — showed  indeed  a  most  blameable  presump- 
tion ;  yet  our  Lord  only  answered  them  with  calm  and  gentle  dignity. 
"  No  ;  my  time  to  manifest  myself  to  the  world — which  is  your  world 
also,  and  which  therefore  cannot  hate  you  as  it  hates  me — is  not  yet 
come.  Go  ye  up  to  this  feast.  I  choose  not  to  go  up  to  this  feast, 
for  not  yet  has  my  time  been  fulfilled."  So  he  answered  them,  and 
stayed  in  Galilee. 

"  I  go  not  up  yet  unto  this  feast "  is  the  rendering  of  the  English 
version,  adopting  the  reading  ov7ra>,  "  not  yet; "  but  even  if  OVK,  "not" 
be  the  true  reading,  the  meaning  is  substantially  the  same.  The  oirrra) 
in  the  next  clause,  "  my  time  has  not  yet  been  fulfilled,"  distinctly 
intimated  that  such  a  time  would  come,  and  that  it  was  not  His  object 
to  intimate  to  His  brethren — whose  utter  want  of  sympathy  and 
reverence  had  just  been  so  unhappily  displayed — when  that  time 
would  be.  And  there  was  a  reason  for  this.  It  was  essential  for  the 
safety  of  His  life,  which  was  not  to  end  for  six  months  more — it  was 
essential  for  the  carrying  out  of  His  Divine  purposes,  which  were 
closely  enwoven  with  the  events  of  •  the  next  few  days — that  His 
brethren  should  not  know  about  His  plans.  And  therefore  He  let 
them  depart  in  the  completest  uncertainty  as  to  whether  or  not  He 
intended  to  follow  them.  Certain  as  they  were  to  be  asked  by  multi- 
tudes whether  He  was  coming  to  the  feast,  it  was  necessary  that 
they  should  be  able  to  answer,  with  perfect  truthfulness,  that 
He  was  at  any  rate  not  coming  with  them,  and  that  whether  He 
would  come  before  the  feast  was  over  or  not  they  could  not  tell. 
And  that  this  must  have  occurred,  and  that  this  must  have  been  their 
answer,  is  evident  from  the  fact  that  the  one  question  buzzed  about 
from  ear  to  ear  in  those  gay  and  busy  streets  was,  "  Where  is  he  ?  is 
He  here  already  ?  is  He  coming  ?"  And  as  He  did  not  appear,  His 
whole  character,  His  whole  mission  were  discussed.  The  words  of 
approval  were  vague  and  timid.  "  He  is  a  good  man  ;"  the  words  of 
condemnation  were  bitter  and  emphatic,  "  Nay,  but  He  is  a  mesith — 
He  deceiveth  the  people."  But  no  one  dared  to  speak  openly  his  full 
thought  about  Him ;  each  seemed  to  distrust  his  neighbour ;  and  all 
feared  to  commit  themselves  too  far  while  the  opinion  of  the  "Jews," 
and  of  the  leading  Priests  and  Pharisees,  had  not  been  finally  or  de- 
cisively declared. 

And  suddenly,  in  the  midst  of  all  these  murmurs  and  discussions, 
in  the  middle  of  the  feast,  Jesus,  unaccompanied  apparently  by  His 
followers,  unheralded  by  His  friends,  appeared  suddenly  in  the  Temple, 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  255 

and  taught.  By  what  route  He  had  reached  the  Holy  City — how  he 
had  passed  through  the  bright  thronged  streets  unnoticed — whether  He 
joined  in  the  innocent  mirth  of  the  festival — whether  He  too  lived  in 
a  little  succah  of  palm-leaves  during  the  remainder  of  the  week,  and 
wandered  among  the  brightly-dressed  crowds  of  an  Oriental  gala  day 
with  the  lulab  and  citron  in  His  hands — whether  his  voice  was  heard 
in  the  Hallel,  or  the  great  Hosanna — we  do  not  know.  All  that  is 
told  us  is  that,  throwing  himself,  as  it  were,  in  full  confidence  on  the 
protection  of  His  disciples  from  Galileo  and  those  [in  Jerusalem,  He 
was  suddenly  found  seated  in  one  of  the  large  halls  which  opened  out 
of  the  Temple  courts,  and  there  He  taught. 

For  a  time  they  listened  to  Him  in  awe-struck  silence ;  but  soon  the 
old  scruples  recurred  to  them.  "  He  is  no  authorised  Rabbi ;  He 
belongs  to  no  recognised  school ;  neither  the  followers  of  Hillel  nor 
those  of  Shammai  claim  Him  ;  He  is  a  Nazarene ;  He  was  trained  in 
the  shop  of  the  Galileean  carpenter ;  how  knoweth  this  man  letters, 
having  never  learned  ?  "  As  though  the  few  who  are  taught  of  God — 
whose  learning  is  the  learning  of  a  pure  heart  and  an  enlightened  eye 
and  a  blameless  life — did  not  unspeakably  transcend  in  wisdom,  and 
therefore  also  in  the  best  and  truest  knowledge,  those  whose  learning 
has  but  come  from  other  men !  It  is  not  the  voice  of  erudition,  but  it 
is,  as  the  old  Greek  thinker  says,  the  voice  of  Inspiration — the  voice 
of  the  divine  Sybil — which,  uttering  things  simple  and  unperfumed 
and  unadorned,  reacheth  through  myriads  of  years. 

Jesus  understood  their  looks.  He  interpreted  their  murmurs.  He 
told  them  that  His  learning  came  immediately  .from  His  Heavenly 
Father,  and  they,  too,  if  they  did  God's  will,  might  learn,  and  might 
understand,  the  same  high  lessons.  In  all  ages  there  is  a  tendency  to 
mistake  erudition  for  learning,  knowledge  for  wisdom;  in  all  ages 
there  has  been  a  slowness  to  comprehend  that  true  learning  of  the 
deepest  and  noblest  character  may  co-exist  with  complete  and  utter 
ignorance  of  everything  which  absorbs  and  constitutes  the  learning  of 
the  schools.  In  one  sense — Jesus  told  His  hearers — they  knew  the 
law  which  Moses  had  given  them ;  in  another  they  were  pitiably 
ignorant  of  it.  They  could  not  understand  its  principles,  because  they 
were  not  "faithful  to  its  precepts."  And  then  He  asked  them  openly, 
"  Why  go  ye  about  to  kill  me  ?" 

That  determination  to  kill  Him  was  known  indeed  to  Him,  and 
known  to  some  of  those  who  heard  Him,  but  was  a  guilty  secret  which 
had  been  concealed  from  the  majority  of  the  multitude.  TltesQ 


256  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

answered  the  qnestion,  while  the  others  kept  their  guilty  silence. 
"  Thou  hast  a  devil,"  the  people  answered ;  "  who  goeth  about  to 
kill  Thee  ?  "  Why  did  they  speak  with  such  superfluous  and  brutal 
bluntness  ?  Do  not  we  repudiate,  with  far  less  flaming  indignation, 
a  charge  which  we  know  to  be  not  only  false,  but  wholly  preposterous 
and  foundationless  ?  Was  there  not  in  the  minds  even  of  this  not  yet 
wholly  alienated  multitude  an  uneasy  sense  of  their  distance  from  the 
Speaker — of  that  unutterable  superiority  to  themselves  which  pained 
and  shamed  and  irritated  them  ?  Were  they  not  conscious,  in  their 
carnal  and  vulgar  aspirations,  that  this  Prophet  came,  not  to  con- 
descend to  such  views  as  theirs,  but  to  raise  them  to  a  region  where 
they  felt  that  they  could  not  breathe  ?  Was  there  not  even  then  in 
their  hearts  something  of  the  half-unconscious  hatred  of  vice  to  virtue, 
the  repulsion  of  darkness  against  light  ?  Would  they  have  said, 
"  Thou  hast  a  devil,"  when  they  heard  Him  say  that  some  of  them 
were  plotting  against  His  life,  if  they  had  not  felt  that  they  were 
themselves  capable  at  almost  any  moment  of  joining  in — aye,  with 
their  own  hands  of  executing — so  base  a  plot  ? 

Jesus  did  not  notice  their  coarse  insolence.  He  referred  them  to 
that  one  work  of  healing  on  the  Sabbath  day  (John  v.  5),  at  which 
they  were  all  still  marvelling,  with  an  empty  wonder,  that  He  who 
had  the  power  to  perform  such  a  deed  should,  in  performing  it,  have 
risen  above  their  empty,  ceremonial,  fetish-worshipping  notions  of 
Sabbath  sanctity.  And  Jesus,  who  ever  loved  to  teach  the  lesson  that 
love  and  not  literalism  is  the  fulfilling  of  the  Law,  showed  them,  even 
on  their  own  purely  ritual  and  Levitical  principle,  that  His  word  of 
healing  had  in  no  respect  violated  the  Sabbath  at  all.  For  instance, 
Moses  had  established,  or  rather  re-established,  the  ordinance  of  cir- 
cumcision on  the  eighth  day,  and  if  that  eighth  day  happened  to  be  a 
Sabbath,  they  without  scruple  sacrificed  the  one  ordinance  to  the 
other,  and  in  spite  of  the  labour  which  it  involved,  performed  the  rite 
of  circumcision  on  the  Sabbath  day.  If  the  law  of  circumcision  super- 
seded that  of  the  Sabbath,  did  not  the  law  of  Mercy  ?  If  it  was  right 
by  a  series  of  actions  to  inflict  that  wound,  was  it  wrong  by  a  single 
word  to  effect  a  total  cure  ?  If  that,  which  was  at  the  best  but  a  sign 
of  deliverance,  could  not  even  on  account  of  the  Sabbath  be  postponed 
for  a  single  day,  why  was  it  criminal  not  to  have  postponed  for  the 
sake  of  the  Sabbath  a  deliverance  actual  and  entire  ?  And  then  He 
summed  His  self-defence  in  the  one  calm  word,  "Do  not  be  ever 
judging  by  the  mere  appearance,  but  judge  a  righteous  judgment ; " 


THB   LIFE    OF   CHKIST.  257 

instead  of  being  permanently  content  with  a  superficial  mode  of 
criticism,  come  once  for  all  to  some  principle  of  righteous  decision. 

His  hearers  were  perplexed  and  amazed,  "  Is  this  He  against  whose 
life  some  are  plotting  ?  Can  He  be  the  Messiah  ?  Nay,  He  cannot 
be ;  for  we  know  whence  this  speaker  comes,  whereas  they  say  that 
none  shall  know  whence  the  Messiah  shall  have  come  when  he 
appears." 

There  was  a  certain  irony  in  the  answer  of  Jesus.  They  knew 
whence  He  came  and  all  about  Him,  and  yet,  in  very  truth,  He  came 
not  of  Himself,  but  from  one  of  whom  they  knew  nothing.  This  word 
maddened  still  more  some  of  His  hearers.  They  longed  but  did  not 
dare  to  seize  Him,  and  all  the  more  because  there  were  some  whom 
these  words  convinced,  and  who  appealed  to  His  many  miracles  as 
irresistible  proof  of  His  sacred  claims.  The  Sanhedrin,  seated  in 
frequent  session  in  their  stone  hall  of  meeting  within  the  immediate 
precincts  of  the  Temple,  were,  by  means  of  their  emissaries,  kept  in- 
formed of  all  that  He  did  and  said,  and,  without  seeming  to  do  so, 
watched  His  every  movement  with  malignant  and  jealous  eyes.  These 
whispered  arguments  in  His  favour,  this  deepened  awe  of  Him  and 
belief  in  Him,  which,  despite  their  authority,  was  growing  up  under 
their  very  eyes,  seemed  to  them  at  once  humiliating  and  dangerous. 
They  determined  on  a  bolder  course  of  action.  They  sent  out  emis- 
saries to  seize  Him  suddenly  and  stealthily,  at  the  first  opportunity 
which  should  occur.  But  Jesus  showed  no  fear.  He  was  to  be  with 
them  a  little  longer,  then,  and  not  till  then,  should  He  return  to  Him 
that  sent  Him.  Then,  indeed,  they  would  seek  Him — seek  Him,  not 
as  now  with  hostile  intentions,  but  in  all  the  crushing  agony  of  remorse 
and  shame ;  but  their  search  would  be  in  vain.  His  enemies  wholly 
failed  to  understand  the  allusion.  In  the  troubled  and  terrible  days 
which  were  to  come  they  would  understand  it  only  too  bitterly  and 
well.  Now  they  could  only  jeeringly  conjecture  that  possibly  He  had 
some  wild  intention  of  going  to  teach  among  the  Gentiles. 

So  passed  this  memorable  day ;  and  again,  on  the  last  day  of  the 
feast,  Jesus  was  standing  in  the  Temple.  On  each  day  of  the  seven, 
and,  possibly,  even  on  the  eighth,  there  was  a  significant  and  joyous 
ceremony.  At  early  morning  the  people  repaired  to  the  Temple,  and 
when  the  morning  sacrifice  had  been  laid  on  the  altar,  one  of  th» 
priests  went  down  with  a  golden  ewer  to  the  Pool  of  Siloam,  not  far 
from  the  foot  of  Mount  Sion.  There,  with  great  solemnity,  he  drew 
three  log.*  of  water,  which  were  then  carried  in  triumphant  procession 


258  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

through  the  water-gate  into  the  Temple.  As  he  entered  the  Temple 
courts  the  sacred  trumpets  breathed  out  a  joyous  blast,  which  continued 
till  he  reached  the  top  of  the  altar  slope,  and  there  poured  the  water 
into  a  silver  bason  on  the  western  side,  while  wine  was  poured  into 
another  silver  bason  on  the  eastern  side.  Then  the  great  Hallel  was 
sung,  and  when  they  came  to  the  verse  "  Oh  give  thanks  unto  the 
Lord,  for  He  is  good  :  for  His  mercy  endureth  for  ever,"  each  of  the 
gaily-clad  worshippers,  as  he  stood  beside  the  altars,  shook  his  lulab 
in  triumph.  In  the  evening  they  abandoned  themselves  to  such 
rejoicing,  that  the  Rabbis  say  that  the  man  who  has  not  seen  this  "joy 
of  the  drawing  water  "  does  not  know  what  joy  means. 

In  evident  allusion  to  this  glad  custom— perhaps  in  sympathy  with 
that  sense  of  something  missing  which  succeeded  the  disuse  of  it  on 
the  eighth  day  of  the  feast — Jesus  pointed  the  yearnings  of  the  festal 
crowd  in  the  Temple,  as  He  had  done  those  of  the  Samaritan  woman 
by  the  lonely  well,  to  a  new  truth,  and  to  one  which  more  than  fulfilled 
alike  the  spiritual  (Isa.  xii.  3)  and  the  historical  meaning  (1  Cor.  x.  4) 
of  the  scenes  which  they  had  witnessed.  He  "  stood  and  cried,  If  any 
man  thirst,  let  him  come  unto  me  and  drink.  He  that  believeth  on 
me,  as  the  Scripture  hath  said,  out  of  his  belly  shall  flow  rivers  of 
living  water."  And  the  best  of  them  felt  in  their  inmost  soul — and 
this  is  the  strongest  of  all  the  evidences  of  Christianity  for  those  who 
believe  heart  and  soul  in  a  God  of  love  who  cares  for  His  children  in 
the  family  of  man — that  they  had  deep  need  of  a  comfort  and  salvation, 
of  the  outpouring  of  a  Holy  Spirit,  which  He  who  spake  to  them  could 
alone  bestow.  But  the  very  fact  that  some  were  beginning  openly  to 
speak  of  Him  as  the  Prophet  and  the  Christ,  only  exasperated  the 
others.  They  had  a  small  difficulty  of  their  own  creating,  founded 
on  pure  ignorance  of  fact,  but  which  yet  to  their  own  narrow  dogmatic 
fancy  was  irresistible — "  Shall  Christ  come  out  of  Galilee  ?  must  He 
not  come  from  Bethlehem  ?  of  David's  seed  ?  " 

It  was  during  this  division  of  opinion  that  the  officers  whom  the 
Pharisees  had  dispatched  to  seize  Jesus,  returned  to  them  without 
having  even  attempted  to  carry  out  their  design.  As  they  hovered 
among  the  Temple  courts,  as  they  stood  half  sheltered  behind  the 
Temple  pillars,  not  unobserved,  it  may  be,  by  Him  for  whom  they 
were  lying  in  wait,  they  too  could  not  fail  to  hear  some  of  the  divine 
words  which  flowed  out  of  His  mouth.  And,  hearing  them,  they  could 
not  fulfil  their  mission.  A  sacred  spell  was  upon  them,  which  they 
were  unable  to  resist ;  a  force  infinitely  more  powerful  than  their  own, 


THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  259 

unnerved  their  strength  and  paralysed  their  will.  To  listen  to  Him 
was  not  only  to  be  disarmed  in  every  attempt  against  Him,  it  was  even 
to  be  half-converted  from  bitter  enemies  to  awe-struck  disciples. 
"  Never  man  spake  like  this  man,"  was  all  that  they  could  say.  That 
bold  disobedience  to  positive  orders  must  have  made  them  afraid  of 
the  possible  consequences  to  themselves,  but  obedience  would  have  re- 
quired a  courage  even  greater,  to  say  nothing  of  that  rankling  wound 
wherewith  an  awakened  conscience  ever  pierces  the  breast  of  crime. 

The  Pharisees  could  only  meet  them  with  angry  taunts.  "  "What, 
ye  too  intend  to  accept  this  Prophet  of  the  ignorant,  this  favourite  of 
the  accursed  and  miserable  mob!"  Then  Nicodemus  ventured  on  a 
timid  word,  "  Ought  you  not  to  try,  before  you  condemn  Him  ?  "  They 
had  no  reply  to  the  justice  of  that  principle :  they  could  only  fall  back 
again  on  taunts — "  Are  you  then  a  Galilsean  ? "  and  then  the  old 
ignorant  dogmatism,  "  Search,  and  look :  for  out  of  Galilee  ariseth  no 
prophet." 

Where  then,  as  we  have  asked  already,  was  Q-athhepher,  whence 
Jonah  came  ?  where  Thisbe,  whence  Elijah  came  ?  where  Elkosh, 
whence  Nahum  came  ?  where  the  northern  town  whence  Hosea 
came  ?  The  more  recent  Jews,  with  better  knowledge  of  Scripture, 
declare  that  the  Messiah  is  to  come  from  Galilee  ;  and  they  settle 
at  Tiberias,  because  they  believe  that  He  will  rise  from  the  waters 
of  the  Lake ;  and  at  Safed,  "  the  city  set  on  a  hill,"  because  they  believe 
that  He  will  there  first  fix  His  throne.  But  there  is  no  ignorance  so 
deep  as  the  ignorance  that  will  not  know ;  no  blindness  so  incurable 
as  the  blindness  which  will  not  see.  And  the  dogmatism  of  a  narrow 
and  stolid  prejudice  which  believes  itself  to  be  theological  learning 
is,  of  all  others,  the  most  ignorant  and  the  most  blind.  Such  was  the 
spirit  in  which,  ignoring  the  mild  justice  of  Nicodemus,  and  the  mar- 
vellous impression  made  by  Jesus  even  on  their  own  hostile  apparitors, 
the  majority  of  the  Sanhedrin  broke  up,  and  went  each  to  his  own 
home. 


260  THE   L1PB   OP  CHEIST. 

CHAPTER    XL. 

TOE  WOMAX  TAKEN  IN  ADULTERY. 

IN  the  difficulties  which  beset  the  celebrated  incident  which  follows, 
it  is  impossible  for  us  to  arrive  at  any  certainty  as  to  its  true  position 
in  the  narrative.  As  there  must,  however,  be  some  a  priori  probability 
that  its  place  was  assigned  with  due  reference  to  the  order  of  events, 
and  as  there  appear  to  be  some  obvious  though  indirect  references  to 
it  in  the  discourses  which  immediately  follow  (ex.  gr.,  John  viii.  15, 
17,  24,  46),  I  shall  proceed  to  speak  of  it  here,  feeling  no  shadow  of 
a  doubt  that  the  incident  really  happened,  even  if  the  form  in  which 
it  is  preserved  to  us  is  by  no  means  indisputably  genuine. 

At  the  close  of  the  day  recorded  in  the  last  chapter,  Jesus  with- 
drew to  the  Mount  of  Olives.  Whether  He  went  to  the  garden  of 
Gethsemane,  and  to  the  house  of  its  unknown  but  friendly  owner,  or 
whether — not  having  where  to  lay  His  head — He  simply  slept,  Eastern 
fashion,  on  the  green  turf  under  those  ancient  olive-trees,  we  cannot 
tell;  but  it  is  interesting  to  trace  in  Him  once  more  that  dislike  of 
crowded  cities,  that  love  for  the  pure,  sweet,  fresh  air,  and  for  the 
quiet  of  the  lonely  hill,  which  we  see  in  all  parts  of  His  career  on 
earth.  There  was,  indeed,  in  Him  nothing  of  that  supercilious  senti- 
mentality and  morbid  egotism  which  makes  men  shrink  from  all 
contact  with  their  brother-men  ;  nor  can  they  who  would  be  His  true 
servants  belong  to  those  merely  fantastic  philanthropists 

"  Who  sigh  for  wretchedness,  yet  shun  the  wretched, 
Nursing  in  some  delicious  solitude 
Their  dainty  loves  and  slothful  sympathies." 

COLBRIDOE,  Religious  Musings. 

On  the  contrary,  day  after  day,  while  His  day-time  of  work  continued, 
we  find  Him  sacrificing  all  that  was  dearest  and  most  elevating  to  His 
soul,  and  in  spite  of  heat,  and  pressure,  and  conflict,  and  weariness, 
calmly  pursuing  His  labours  of  love  amid  "the  madding  crowd's 
ignoble  strife."  But  in  the  night-time,  when  men  cannot  work,  no 
call  of  dnty  required  His  presence  within  the  walls  of  Jerusalem ;  and 
those  who  are  familiar  with  the  oppressive  foulness  of  ancient  cities 
can  best  imagine  the  relief  which  His  spirit  must  have  felt  when  He 
could  escape  from  the  close  streets  and  thronged  bazaars,  to  cross  the 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  261 

ravine,  and  climb  the  green  slope  beyond  it,  and  be  alone  with  Hia 
Heavenly  Father  under  the  starry  night. 

But  when  the  day  dawned  His  duties  lay  once  more  within  the  city 
walls,  and  in  that  part  of  the  city  where,  almost  alone,  we  hear  of  Hia 
presence — in  the  courts  of  His  Father's  house.  And  with  the  very 
dawn  His  enemies  contrived  a  fresh  plot  against  Him,  the  circum- 
stances of  which  made  their  malice  even  more  actually  painful  than  it 
was  intentionally  perilous. 

It  is  probable  that  the  hilarity  and  abandonment  of  the  Feast  of 
Tabernacloa,  which  had  grown  to  be  a  kind  of  vintage  festival,  would 
often  degenerate  into  acts  of  licence  and  immorality,  and  these  would 
find  more  numerous  opportunities  in  the  general  disturbance  of  ordi- 
nary life  caused  by  the  dwelling  of  the  whole  people  in  their  little 
leafy  booths.  One  such  act  had  been  detected  during  the  previous 
night,  and  the  guilty  woman  had  been  handed  over  to  the  Scribes  and 
Pharisees. 

Even  had  the  morals  of  the  nation  at  that  time  been  as  clean  as  in 
the  days  when  Moses  ordained  the  fearful  ordeal  of  the  "  water  of 
jealousy" — even  had  these  rulers  and  teachers  of  the  nation  been 
elevated  as  far  above  their  contemporaries  in  the  real,  as  in  the  pro- 
fessed, sanctity  of  their  lives — the  discovery,  and  the  threatened 
punishment,  of  this  miserable  adulteress  could  hardly  have  failed  to 
move  every  pure  and  noble  mind  to  a  compassion  which  would  have 
mingled  largely  with  the  horror  which  her  sin  inspired.  They  might, 
indeed,  even  on  those  suppositions,  have  inflicted  the  established 
penalty  with  a  sternness  as  inflexible  as  that  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  in 
the  early  days  of  Salem  or  Providence  ;  but  the  sternness  of  a  severe 
and  pure-hearted  judge  is  not  a  sternness  which  precludes  all  pity;  it 
is  a  sternness  which  would  not  willingly  inflict  one  unnecessary  pang 
— it  is  a  sternness  not  incompatible  with  a  righteous  tenderness,  but 
wholly  incompatible  with  a  mixture  of  meaner  and  slighter  motives, 
wholly  incompatible  with  a  spirit  of  malignant  levity  and  hideous 
sport. 

But  the  spirit  which  actuated  these  Scribes  and  Pharisees  was  not 
by  any  means  the  spirit  of  a  sincere  and  outraged  purity.  In  the 
decadence  of  national  life,  in  the  daily  familiarity  with  heathen  degra- 
dations, in  the  gradual  substitution  of  a  Levitical  scrupulosity  for  a 
heartfelt  religion,  the  morals  of  the  nation  had  grown  utterly  corrupt. 
The  ordeal  of  the  "  water  of  jealousy  "  had  long  been  abolished,  and 
the  death  by  stoning  as  a  punishment  for  adultery  had  long  been 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHKIST. 

suffered  to  fall  into  desuetude.  Not  even  the  Scribes  and  Pharisees 
— for  all  their  external  religiosity — had  any  genuine  horror  of  an 
impurity  with  which  their  own  lives  were  often  stained.  They  saw 
in  the  accident  which  had  put  this  guilty  woman  into  their  power 
nothing  but  a  chance  of  annoying,  entrapping,  possibly  even  endan- 
gering this  Prophet  of  Galilee,  whom  they  already  regarded  as  their 
deadliest  enemy. 

It  was  a  curious  custom  among  the  Jews  to  consult  distinguished 
Rabbis  in  cases  of  doubt  and  difficulty ;  but  there  was  no  doubt  or 
difficulty  here.  It  was  long  since  the  Mosaic  law  of  death  to  the  adul- 
teress had  been  demanded  or  enforced  ;  and  even  if  this  had  not  been 
the  case,  the  Roman  law  would,  in  all  probability,  have  prevented  such 
a  sentence  from  being  put  in  execution.  On  the  other  hand,  the  civil 
and  religious  penalties  of  divorce  were  open  to  the  injured  husband ; 
nor  did  the  case  of  this  woman  differ  from  that  of  any  other  who  had 
similarly  transgressed.  Nor,  again,  even  if  they  had  honestly  and 
sincerely  desired  the  opinion  of  Jesus,  could  there  have  been  the 
slightest  excuse  for  haling  the  woman  herself  into  His  presence,  and 
thus  subjecting  her  to  a  moral  torture  which  would  be  rendered  all  the 
more  insupportable  from  the  close  seclusion  of  women  in  the  East. 

And,  therefore,  to  subject  her  to  the  superfluous  horror  of  this 
odious  publicity — to  drag  her,  fresh  from  the  agony  of  detection, 
into  the  sacred  precincts  of  the  Temple — to  subject  this  unveiled,  dis- 
hevelled, terror-stricken  woman  to  the  cold  and  sensual  curiosity  of  a 
malignant  mob — to  make  her,  with  total  disregard  to  her  own  suffer- 
ings, the  mere  passive  instrument  of  their  hatred  against  Jesus ;  and 
to  do  all  this — not  under  the  pressure  of  moral  indignation,  but  in 
order  to  gratify  a  calculating  malice — showed  on  their  parts  a  cold, 
hard  cynicism,  a  graceless,  pitiless,  barbarous  brutality  of  heart  and 
conscience,  which  could  not  but  prove,  in  every  particular,  revolting 
and  hateful  to  One  who  alone  was  infinitely  tender,  because  He  alone 
was  infinitely  pure. 

And  so  they  dragged  her  to  Him,  and  set  her  in  the  midst — flagrant 
guilt  subjected  to  the  gaze  of  stainless  Innocence,  degraded  misery  set 
before  the  bar  of  perfect  Mercy.  And  then,  just  as  though  their  hearts 
were  not  full  of  outrage,  they  glibly  begin,  with  ironical  deference,  to 
set  before  Him  their  case.  "  Master,  this  woman  was  seized  in  the 
very  act  of  adultery.  Now,  Moses  in  the  Law  commanded  us  to  stone 
such ;  but  what  sayest  Thou  about  her  ?  " 

They  thought  that  now  they  had  caught  Him  in  a  dilemma.     They 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHBJST.  263 

knew  the  divine  trembling  pity  which  had  loved  where  others  hated, 
and  praised  where  others  scorned,  and  encouraged  where  others  crushed ; 
and  they  knew  how  that  pity  had  won  for  Him  the  admiration  of  many, 
the  passionate  devotion  of  not  a  few.  They  knew  that  a  publican  was 
among  His  chosen,  that  sinners  had  sat  with  Him  at  the  banquet,  and 
harlots  unreproved  had  bathed  His  feet,  and  listened  to  His  words. 
"Would  He  then  acquit  this  woman,  and  so  make  Himself  liable  to  an 
accusation  of  heresy,  by  placing  Himself  in  open  disaccord  with  the 
sacred  and  fiery  Law  ?  or,  on  the  other  hand,  would  He  belie  His  own 
compassion,  and  be  ruthless,  and  condemn  ?  And,  if  He  did,  would 
He  not  at  once  shock  the  multitude,  who  were  touched  by  His  tender- 
ness, and  offend  the  civil  magistrates  by  making  Himself  liable  to  a 
charge  of  sedition  ?  How  could  He  possibly  get  out  of  the  difficulty  ? 
Either  alternative — heresy  or  treason,  accusation  before  the  Sanhedrin 
or  delation  to  the  Procurator,  opposition  to  the  orthodox  or  alienation 
from  the  many — would  serve  equally  well  their  unscrupulous  inten- 
tions. And  one  of  these,  they  thought,  must  follow.  What  a  happy 
chance  this  weak,  guilty  woman  had  given  them  ! 

Not  yet.  A  sense  of  all  their  baseness,  their  hardness,  their  malice, 
their  cynical  parade  of  every  feeling  which  pity  would  temper  and 
delicacy  repress,  rushed  over  the  mind  of  Jesus.  He  blushed  for  His 
nation,  for  His  race ;  He  blushed,  not  for  the  degradation  of  the  miser- 
able accused,  but  for  the  deeper  guilt  of  her  unblushing  accusers. 
Glowing  with  uncontrollable  disgust  that  modes  of  opposition  so  irre- 
deemable in  their  meanness  should  be  put  in  play  against  Him,  and 
that  He  should  be  made  the  involuntary  centre  of  such  a  shameful 
scene — indignant  (for  it  cannot  be  irreverent  to  imagine  in  Him  an 
intensified  degree  of  emotions  which  even  the  humblest  of  His  true 
followers  would  have  shared)  that  the  sacredness  of  His  personal 
reserve  should  thus  be  shamelessly  violated,  and  that  those  things 
which  belong  to  the  sphere  of  a  noble  reticence  should  be  thus  cyni- 
cally obtruded  on  His  notice — He  bent  his  face  forwards  from  His  seat, 
and  as  though  He  did  not,  or  would  not,  hear  them,  stooped  and  wrote 
with  Hift  finger  on  the  ground. 

For  any  others  but  such  as  these  it  would  have  been  enough. 
Even  if  they  failed  to  see  in  the  action  a  symbol  of  forgiveness — a 
symbol  that  the  memory  of  things  thus  written  in  the  dust  might  be 
obliterated  and  forgotten — still  any  but  these  could  hardly  have  failed 
to  interpret  the  gesture  into  a  distinct  indication  that  in  such  a  matter 
Jesus  would  not  mix  himself.  But  they  saw  nothing  and  understood 


264  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

nothing,  and  stood  there  unabashed,  still  pressing  their  brutal  question, 
still  holding,  pointing  to,  jeering  at  the  woman,  with  no  compunction 
in  their  cunning  glances,  and  no  relenting  in  their  steeled  hearts. 

The  scene  could  not  last  any  longer ;  and,  therefore,  raising  Him- 
self from  His  stooping  attitude,  He,  who  could  read  their  hearts, 
calmly  passed  upon  them  that  sad  judgment  involved  in  the  memorable 
words — 

"  Let  him  that  is  without  sin  among  you,  first  cast  the  stone  at 
her." 

It  was  not  any  abrogation  of  the  Mosaic  law ;  it  was,  on  the  con- 
trary, an  admission  of  its  justice,  and  doubtless  it  must  have  sunk 
heavily  as  a  death-warrant  upon  the  woman's  heart.  But  it  acted  in  a 
manner  wholly  unexpected.  The  terrible  law  stood  written;  it  was 
not  the  time,  it  was  not  His  will,  to  rescind  it.  But,  on  the  other 
hand,  they  themselves,  by  not  acting  on  the  law,  by  referring  the 
whole  question  to  Him  as  though  it  needed  a  new  solution,  had  prac- 
tically confessed  that  the  law  was  at  present  valid  in  theory  alone, 
that  it  had  fallen  into  desuetude,  and  that  even  with  his  authority 
they  had  no  intention  of  carrying  it  into  action.  Since,  therefore,  the 
whole  proceeding  was  on  their  part  illegal  and  irregular,  He  transfers 
it  by  these  words  from  the  forum  of  law  to  that  of  conscience.  The 
judge  may  sometimes  be  obliged  to  condemn  the  criminal  brought 
before  him  for  sins  of  which  he  has  himself  been  guilty,  but  the  posi- 
tion of  the  self-constituted  accuser  who  eagerly  demands  a  needless 
condemnation  is  very  different.  Herein  to  condemn  her  would  have 
been  in  God's  sight  most  fatally  to  have  condemned  themselves ;  to 
have  been  the  first  to  cast  the  stone  at  her  would  have  been  to  crush 
themselves. 

He  had  but  glanced  at  them  for  a  moment,  but  that  glance  had 
read  their  inmost  souls.  He  had  but  calmly  spoken  a  few  simple 
words,  but  those  words,  like  the  still  small  voice  to  Elijah  at  Horeb, 
had  been  more  terrible  than  wind  or  earthquake.  They  had  fallen 
like  a  spark  of  fire  upon  slumbering  souls,  and  lay  burning  there  till 
"  the  blushing,  shame-faced  spirit "  mutinied  within  them.  The 
Scribes  and  Pharisees  stood  silent  and  fearful ;  they  loosed  their  hold 
upon  the  woman ;  their  insolent  glances,  so  full  of  guile  and  malice, 
fell  guiltily  to  the  ground.  They  who  had  unjustly  inflicted,  now 
justly  felt  the  overwhelming  anguish  of  an  intolerable  shame,  while 
over  their  guilty  consciences  there  rolled,  in  crash  on  crash  of  thunder, 
such  thoughts  as  these: — "Therefore  thou  art  inexcusable,  0  man, 


THE   LIFE    Of  CHRIST.  265 

whosoever  thou  art  that  judgest ;  for  wherein  thou  judgest  another, 
thou  condemnest  thyself  :  for  thou  that  judgest  doest  the  same  things. 
But  we  are  sure  that  the  judgment  of  God  is  according  to  truth 
against  them  which  commit  such  things.  And  thinkest  thou  this,  0 
man,  that  judgest  them  which  do  such  things  and  doest  the  same,  that 
thou  shalt  escape  the  judgment  of  God  ?  or  despisest  thou  the  riches 
of  His  goodness,  and  forbearance,  and  long-suffering;  not  knowing 
that  the  goodness  of  God  leadeth  thee  to  repentance  ?  but  after  thy 
hardness  and  impenitent  heart  treasurest  up  to  thyself  wrath  against 
the  day  of  wrath  and  revelation  of  the  righteous  judgment  of  God, 
who  will  render  to  every  man  according  to  his  deeds."  They  were 
"  such "  as  the  woman  they  had  condemned,  and  they  dared  not 
stay. 

And  so,  with  burning  cheeks  and  cowed  hearts,  from  the  .eldest  to 
the  youngest,  one  by  one  gradually,  silently  they  slunk  away.  He 
would  not  add  to  their  shame  and  confusion  of  face  by  watching  them  : 
He  had  no  wish  further  to  reveal  His  knowledge  of  the  impure 
secrets  of  their  hearts ;  He  would  not  tempt  them  to  brazen  it  out 
before  Him,  and  to  lie  against  the  testimony  of  their  own  memories  ; 
He  had  stooped  down  once  more,  and  was  writing  on  the  ground. 

And  when  He  once  more  raised  His  head,  all  the  accusers  had 
melted  away :  only  the  woman  still  cowered  before  Him  on  the 
Temple-floor.  She,  too,  might  have  gone  :  none  hindered  her,  and  it 
might  have  seemed  but  natural  that  she  should  fly  anywhere  to  escape 
her  danger,  and  to  hide  her  guilt  and  shame.  But  remorse,  and,  it  may 
be,  an  awful  trembling  gratitude,  in  which  hope  struggled  with  despair, 
fixed  her  there  before  her  Judge.  His  look,  the  most  terrible  of  all  to 
meet,  because  it  was  the  only  look  that  fell  on  her  from  a  soul  robed 
in  the  unapproachable  majesty  of  a  stainless  innocence,  was  at  the  same 
time  the  most  gentle,  and  the  most  forgiving.  Her  stay  was  a  sign  of 
her  penitence ;  her  penitence,  let  us  trust,  a  certain  pledge  of  her 
future  forgiveness.  "  Two  things,"  as  St.  Augustine  finely  says, 
"  wereliere  left  alone  together — Misery  and  Mercy." 

"  Woman,"  He  asked,  "  where  are  those  thine  accusers  ?  did  no 
one  convict  thee  ?  " 

"No  man,  Lord."  It  was  the  only  answer  which  her  lips  could 
find  power  to  frame ;  and  then  she  received  the  gracious  yet  heart- 
searching  permission  to  depart — 

"  Neither  do  I  convict  thee.     Go  ;  henceforth  sin  no  more." 

Were  the  critical  evidence  against  the  genuineness  of  this  pas- 


266  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

sage  far  more .  overwhelming  tuctn  it  is,  it  would  yet  bear  upon 
its  surface  the  strongest  possible  proof  of  its  own  authentic  truth- 
fulness. It  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that  the  mixture  which  it  dis- 
plays of  tragedy  and  of  tenderness — the  contrast  which  it  involves 
between  low,  cruel  cunning,  and  exalted  nobility  of  intellect  and  emotion 
— transcends  all  power  of  human  imagination  to  have  invented  it ; 
while  the  picture  of  a  divine  insight  reading  the  inmost  secrets  of  the 
heart,  and  a  yet  diviner  love,  which  sees  those  inmost  secrets  with 
larger  eyes  than  ours,  furnish  us  with  a  conception  of  Christ's  power 
and  person  at  once  too  lofty  and  too  original  to  have  been  founded  on 
anything  but  fact.  No  one  could  have  invented,  for  few  could  even 
appreciate,  the  sovereign  purity  and  ineffable  charm — the  serene 
authority  of  condemnation,  and  of  pardon — by  which  the  story  is 
so  deeply  characterised.  The  repeated  instances  in  which,  with- 
out a  moment's  hesitation,  He  foiled  the  crafty  designs  of  His 
enemies,  and  in  foiling  them  taught  for  ever  some  eternal  prin- 
ciple of  thought  and  action,  are  among  the  most  unique  and  decisive 
proofs  of  His  more  than  human  wisdom ;  and  jret  not  one  of  those 
gleams  of  sacred  light  which  were  struck  from  Him  by  collision  with 
the  malice  or  hate  of  man  was  brighter  or  more  beautiful  than  this. 
The  very  fact  that  the  narrative  found  so  little  favour  in  the  early 
centuries  of  Church  history — the  fact  that  whole  Churches  regarded 
the  narrative  as  dangerous  in  its  tendency — the  fact  that  eminent 
Fathers  of  the  Church  either  ignore  it  or  speak  of  it  in  a  semi-apolo- 
getic tone — in  these  facts  we  see  the  most  decisive  proof  that  its  real 
moral  and  meaning  are  too  transcendent  to  admit  of  its  having  been 
originally  invented,  or  interpolated  without  adequate  authority  into  the 
sacred  text.  Yet  it  is  strange  that  any  should  have  failed  to  see  that 
in  the  ray  of  mercy  which  thus  streamed  from  heaven  upon  the 
wretched  sinner,  the  sin  assumed  an  aspect  tenfold  more  heinous, 
tenfold  more  repulsive  to  the  conscience  of  mankind — to  every 
conscience  which  accepts  it  as  a  law  of  life  that  it  should  strive  to  be 
holy  as  God  is  holy,  and  pure  as  He  is  pure. 

However  painful  this  scene  must  have  been  to  the  holy  and  loving 
heart  of  the  Saviour,  it  was  at  least  alleviated  by  the  sense  of  that 
compassionate  deliverance — deliverance,  we  may  trust,  for  Eternity,  no 
less  than  Time — which  it  had  wrought  for  one  guilty  soul.  But  the 
scenes  that  followed  were  a  climax  of  perpetual  misunderstandings, 
fluctuating  impressions,  and  bitter  taunts,  which  caused  the  great  and 
joyous  festival  to  end  with  a  sudden  burst  of  rage,  and  an  attempt  of 


THE    LIFE    OF    CHBIST.  267 

the  Jewish  leaders  to  make  an  end  of  Him — not  by  public  accusation, 
but  by  furious  violence. 

For,  on  the  same  day — the  eighth  day  of  the  feast  if  the  last 
narrative  has  got  displaced,  the  day  after  the  feast  if  it  belongs  to  the 
true  sequence  of  events — Jesus  continued  those  interrupted  discourses 
which  were  intended  almost  for  the  last  time  to  set  clearly  before  the 
Jewish  nation  His  divine  claims. 

He  was  seated  at  that  moment  in  the  Treasury — either  some  special 
building  in  the  Temple  so  called,  or  that  part  of  the  court  of  the 
women  which  contained  the  thirteen  chests  with  trumpet-shaped 
openings — called  shopheroth — into  which  the  people,  and  espicially  the 
Pharisees,  used  to  cast  their  gifts.  In  this  court,  and  therefore  close 
beside  Him,  were  two  gigantic  candelabra,  fifty  cubits  high  and 
sumptuously  gilded,  on  the  summit  of  which,  nightly,  during  the 
Feast  of  Tabernacles,  lamps  were  lit  which  shed  their  soft  light  over 
all  the  city.  Round  these  lamps  the  people,  in  their  joyful  enthu- 
siasm, and  even  the  stateliest  Priests  and  Pharisees,  joined  in  festal 
dances,  while,  to  the  sound  of  flutes  and  other  music,  the  Levites, 
drawn  up  in  array  on  the  fifteen  steps  which  led  up  to  the  court, 
chanted  the  beautiful  Psalms  which  early  received  the  title  of  "  Songs 
of  Degrees." 

In  allusion  to  these  great  lamps,  on  which  some  circumstance  of 
the  moment  may  have  concentrated  the  attention  of  the  hearers,  Christ 
exclaimed  to  them,  "  I  am  the  Light  of  the  world."  It  was  His  con- 
stant plan  to  shape  the  illustrations  of  His  discourses  by  those  external 
incidents  which  would  rouse  the  deepest  attention,  and  fix  the  words 
most  indelibly  on  the  memories  of  His  hearers.  The  Pharisees  who 
heard  His  words  charged  Him  with  idle  self-glorification ;  but  He 
showed  them  that  He  had  His  Father's  testimony,  and  that  even  were 
it  not  so,  the  Light  can  only  be  seen,  only  be  known,  by  the  evidence 
of  its  own  existence;  without  it,  neither  itself  nor  anything  else  is 
visible.  They  asked  Him,  "  Where  is  Thy  Father  ?  "  He  told  them, 
that,  not  knowing  Him,  they  could  not  know  His  Father ;  and  then  He 
once  more  sadly  warned  them  that  His  departure  was  nigh,  and  that 
tlien  they  would  be  unable  to  come  to  Him.  Their  only  reply  was  a 
taunting  inquiry  whether,  by  committing  suicide,  He  meant  to  plunge 
Himself  in  the  darkest  regions  of  the  grave  ?  Nay,  He  made  them 
understand,  it  was  they,  not  He,  who  were  from  below — they,  not  He, 
who  were  destined,  if  they  persisted  in  unbelief  of  His  eternal  existence, 
to  that  dark  end.  "  Who  art  thou  ?  "  they  once  more  asked,  in  angry 


2G8  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

and  faithless  perplexity.  "  Altogether  that  which  I  am  telling  yon," 
He  calmly  answered.  They  wanted  Him  to  announce  Himself  as  the 
Messiah,  and  so  become  their  temporal  deliverer ;  but  He  will  only  tell 
them  the  far'deeper,  more  eternal  truths,  that  He  is  the  Light,  and  the 
Life,  and  the  Living  Water,  and  that  He  came  from  the  Father — as 
they,  too,  should  know  when  they  had  lifted  Him  up  upon  the  cross. 
They  were  looking  solely  for  the  Messiah  of  the  Jews  :  He  would  have 
them  know  Him  as  the  Redeemer  of  the  world,  the  Saviour  of  their 
souls. 

As  they  heard  Him  speak,  many,  even  of  these  fierce  enemies, 
were  won  over  to  a  belief  in  Him :  but  it  was  a  wavering  belief,  a  half 
belief,  a  false  belief,  a  belief  mingled  with  a  thousand  worldly  and 
erroneous  fancies,  not  a  belief  which  had  in  it  any  saving  power, 
or  on  which  He  could  rely.  And  He  put  it  to  an  immediate  test, 
which,  revealed  its  hollo wness,  and  changed  it  into  mad  hatred. 
He  told  them  that  faithfulness  and  obedience  were  the  marks  of 
true  discipleship,  and  the  requisites  of  true  freedom.  The  word 
freedom  acted  as  a  touchstone  to  show  the  spuriousness  of  their 
incipient  faith.  They  knew  of  no  freedom  but  that  political  freedom 
which  they  falsely  asserted ;  they  resented  the  promise  of  future 
spiritual  freedom  in  lieu  of  the  achievement  of  present  national 
freedom.  So  Jesus  showed  them  that  they  were  still  the  slaves  of  sin, 
and  in  name  only,  not  in  reality,  the  children  of  Abraham,  or  the 
children  of  God.  They  were  absorbed  with  pride  when  they  thought 
of  the  purity  of  their  ancestral  origin,  and  the  privilege  of  their 
exclusive  monotheism ;  but  Ho  told  them  that  in  very  truth  they  were, 
by  spiritual  affinity,  the  affinity  of  cruelty  and  falsehood,  children  of 
him  who  was  a  liar  and  a  murderer  from  the  beginning — children  of 
the  devil.  That  home-rebuke  stung  them  to  fury.  They  repaid  it 
by  calling  Jesus  a  Samaritan,  and  a  demoniac.  Our  Lord  gently  put 
the  taunt  aside,  and  once  more  held  out  to  them  the  gracious  promise 
that  if  they  will  but  keep  His  sayings,  they  not  only  shall  not  die  in 
their  sins,  but  shall  not  see  death.  Their  dull,  blind  hearts  could  not 
even  imagine  a  spiritual  meaning  in  His  words.  They  could  only 
charge  Him  with  demoniac  arrogance  and  insolence  in  making  Him- 
self greater  than  Abraham  and  the  prophets,  of  whom  they  could  only 
think  as  dead.  Jesus  told  them  that  in  prophetic  vision,  perhaps  too 
by  spiritual  intuition,  in  that  other  world,  Abraham,  who  was  not 
dead,  but  living,  saw  and  rejoiced  to  see  His  day.  Such  an  assertion 
appeared  to  them  either  senseless  or  blasphemous.  "Abraham  has 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHKIST.  200 

been  dead  for  seventeen  centuries ;  Thou  art  not  even  fifty  years  old ; 
how  are  we  to  nnderstand  such  words  as  these  ?  "  Then  very  gently, 
but  with  great  solemnity,  and  with  that  formula  of  asseveration  which 
He  only  used  when  he  announced  His  most  solemn  truths,  the  Saviour 
revealed  to  them  His  eternity,  His  Divine  pre-existence  before  He  had 
entered  the  tabernacle  of  mortal  flesh : 

"Verily,  verily  I  say  unto  you,  Before  Abraham  came  into  exist- 
ence, I  am." 

Then,  with  a  burst  of  impetuous  fury — one  of  those  paroxysms  of 
sudden,  uncontrollable,  frantic  rage  to  which  this  people  has  in  all 
ages  been  liable  upon  any  collision  with  its  religious  convictions — they 
took  up  stones  to  stone  Him.  But  the  very  blindness  of  their  rage 
made  it  more  easy  to  elude  them.  His  hour  was  not  yet  come.  With 
perfect  calmness  He  departed  unhurt  out  of  the  Temple. 


CHAPTER   XLI. 

THE    MAN    BOEN    BLIND. 

EITHER  on  His  way  from  the  Temple,  after  this  attempted  assault,  or 
on  the  next  ensuing  Sabbath,  Jesus,  as  He  passed  by,  saw  a  man  blind 
from  his  birth,  who  perhaps  announced  his  miserable  condition  as  he 
sat  begging  by  the  roadside,  and  at  the  Temple  gate. 

All  the  Jews  were  trained  to  regard  special  suffering  as  the 
necessary  and  immediate  consequence  of  special  sin.  Perhaps  the 
disciples  supposed  that  the  words  of  our  Lord  to  the  paralytic  whom 
He  had  healed  at  the  Pool  of  Bethesda,  as  well  as  to  the  paralytic  at 
Capernaum,  might  seem  to  sanction  such  an  impression.  They  asked, 
therefore,  how  this  man  came  to  be  born  blind.  Could  it  be  in 
consequence  of  the  sins  of  his  parents  ?  If  not,  was  there  any  way 
of  supposing  that  it  could  have  been  for  his  own  ?  The  supposition 
in  the  former  case  seemed  hard ;  in  the  latter,  impossible.  They  were 
therefore  perplexed. 

Into  the  unprofitable  regions  of  such  barren  speculation  our  Lord 
refused  to  follow  them,  and  He  declined,  as  always,  the  tendency  to 
infer  and  to  sit  in  judgment  upon  the  sins  of  others.  Neither  the 


270  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

man's  sins,  He  told  them,  nor  those  of  his  parents,  had  caused  that 
lifelong  affliction ;  but  now,  by  means  of  it,  the  works  of  God  should 
be  made  manifest.  He,  the  Light  of  the  world,  must  for  a  short  time 
longer  dispel  its  darkness.  Then  He  spat  on  the  ground,  made  clay- 
with  the  spittle,  and  smearing  it  on  the  blind  man's  eyes,  bade  him 
"go  wash  in  the  pool  of  Siloam."  The  blind  man  went,  washed, 
and  was  healed. 

The  saliva  of  one  who  had  not  recently  broken  his  fast  was  believed 
among  the  ancients  to  have  a  healing  efficacy  in  cases  of  weak  eyes, 
and  clay  was  occasionally  used  to  repress  tumours  on  the  eyelids. 
Bat  that  these  instruments  in  no  way  detracted  from  the  splendour  of 
the  miracle  is  obvious ;  and  we  have  no  means  of  deciding  in  this,  any 
more  than  in  the  parallel  instances,  why  our  Lord,  who  sometimes 
healed  by  a  word,  preferred  at  other  times  to  adopt  slow  and  more 
elaborate  methods  of  giving  effect  to  His  supernatural  power.  In  this 
matter  He  never  revealed  the  principles  of  action  which  doubtless 
arose  from  His  inner  knowledge  of  the  circumstances,  and  from  His 
insight  into  the  hearts  of  those  on  whom  His  cures  were  wrought. 
Possibly  He  had  acted  with  the  express  view  of  teaching  more  than 
one  eternal  lesson  by  the  incidents  which  followed. 

At  any  rate,  in  this  instance,  His  mode  of  action  led  to  serious 
results.  For  the  man  had  been  well  known  in  Jerusalem  as  one  who 
had  been  a  blind  beggar  all  his  life,  and  his  appearance  with  the  use 
of  his  eyesight  caused  a  tumult  of  excitement.  Scarcely  could  those 
who  had  known  him  best  believe  even  his  own  testimony,  that  he 
was  indeed  the  blind  beggar  with  whom  they  had  been  so  familiar. 
They  were  lost  in  amazement,  and  made  him  repeat  again  and 
again  the  story  of  his  cure.  But  that  story  infused  into  their 
astonishment  a  fresh  element  of  Pharisaic  indignation  ;  for  this 
cure  also  had  been  wrought  on  a  Sabbath  day.  The  Rabbis  had 
forbidden  any  man  to  smear  even  one  of  his  eyes  with  spittle  on  the 
Sabbath,  except  in  cases  of  mortal  danger.  Jesud  had  not  only 
smeared  both  the  man's  eyes,  but  had  actually  mingled  the  saliva  with 
clay !  This,  as  an  act  of  mercy,  was  in  the  deepest  and  most  inward 
accordance  with  the  very  causes  for  which  the  Sabbath  had  been 
ordained,  and  the  very  lessons  of  which  it  was  meant  to  be  a  perpetual 
witness.  But  the  spirit  of  narrow  literalism  and  slavish  minuteness 
and  quantitative  obedience — the  spirit  that  hoped  to  be  saved  by  the 
algebraical  sum  of  good  and  bad  actions — had  long  degraded  the 
Sabbath  from  the  true  idea  of  its  institution  into  a  pernicious  super- 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  271 

stition.  The  Sabbath  of  Rabbinism,  with  all  its  petty  servility,  was 
in  no  respect  the  Sabbath  of  God's  loving  and  holy  law.  It  had  de- 
generated into  that  which  St.  Paul  calls  it,  a  TTTM^IKOV  crrot^ewv, 
or  "beggarly  element  "  (Gal.  iv.  9). 

And  these  Jews  were  so  imbued  with  this  utter  littleness,  that  a 
unique  miracle  of  mercy  awoke  in  them  less  of  astonishment  and 
gratitude  than  the  horror  kindled  by  a  neglect  of  their  Sabbatical 
superstition.  Accordingly,  in  all  the  zeal  of  letter-worshipping 
religionism,  they  led  off  the  man  to  the  Pharisees  in  council.  Then 
followed  the  scene  which  St.  John  has  recorded  in  a  manner  so 
inimitably  graphic  in  his  ninth  chapter.  First  came  the  repeated 
inquiry,  "how  the  thing  had  been  done?"  followed  by  the  repeated 
assertion  of  some  of  them  that  Jesus  could  not  be  from  God,  because 
He  had  not  observed  the  Sabbath;  and  the  reply  of  others  that  to 
press  the  Sabbath-breaking  was  to  admit  the  miracle,  and  to  admit'the 
miracle  was  to  establish  the  fact  that  He  who  performed  it  could  not 
bo  the  criminal  whom  the  others  described.  Then,  being  completely 
at  a  standstill,  they  asked  the  blind  man  his  opinion  of  his  deliverer  ; 
and  he — not  being  involved  in  their  vicious  circle  of  reasoning — replied 
with  fearless  promptitude,  "  He  is  a  Prophet." 

By  this  time  they  saw  the  kind  of  nature  with  which  they  had  to 
deal,  and  anxious  for  any  loophole  by  which  they  could  deny  or  set 
aside  the  miracle,  they  sent  for  the  man's  parents.  "  Was  this  their 
son  ?  If  they  asserted  that  he  had  been  born  blind,  how  was  it  that 
he  now  saw  ? "  Perhaps  they  hoped  to  browbeat  or  to  bribe  these 
parents  into  a  denial  of  their  relationship,  or  an  admission  of  im- 
posture ;  but  the  parents  also  clung  to  the  plain  truth,  while,  with  a 
certain  Judaic  servility  and  cunning,  they  refused  to  draw  any 
inferences  which  would  lay  them  open  to  unpleasant  consequences. 
"  This  is  certainly  our  son,  and  he  was  certainly  born  blind ;  as  to  the 
rest,  we  know  nothing.  Ask  him.  He  is  quite  capable  of  answering 
for  himself." 

Then — one  almost  pities  their  sheer  perplexity — they  turned  to  the 
blind  man  again.  He,  as  well  as  his  parents,  knew  that  the  Jewish 
authorities  had  agreed  to  pronounce  the  cherem,  or  ban  of  exclusion 
from  the  synagogue,  on  any  one  who  should  venture  to  acknowledge 
Jesus  as  the  Messiah ;  and  the  Pharisees  probably  hoped  that  he  would 
be  content  to  follow  their  advice,  to  give  glory  to  God,  i.e.,  deny  or 
ignore  the  miracle,  and  to  accept  their  dictum  that  Jesus  was  a  sinner. 

But  the  man  was  made  of  sturdier  stuff  than  his  parents.     He  was 


272  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

not  to  be  overawed  by  their  authority,  or  knocked  down  by  their 
assertions.  He  breathed  quite  freely  in  the  halo-atmosphere  of  their 
superior  sanctity.  "  We  know,"  the  Pharisees  had  said,  "  that  this 
man  is  a  sinner."  "  "Whether  He  is  a  sinner,"  the  man  replied,  "  I  do 
•not  know ;  one  thing  I  do  know,  that,  being  blind,  now  I  see."  Then 
they  began  again  their  weary  and  futile  cross-examination.  "  What 
did  He  do  to  thee  ?  how  did  He  open  thine  eyes  ?  "  But  the  man  had 
had  enough  of  this.  "  I  told  yon  once,  and  ye  did  not  attend.  Why 
do  ye  wish  to  hear  again  ?  Is  it  possible  that  ye  too  wish  to  be  His 
disciples  ?  "  Bold  irony  this — to  ask  these  stately,  ruffled,  scrupulous 
Sanhedrists,  whether  he  was  really  to  regard  them  as  anxious  and 
sincere  inquirers  about  the  claims  of  the  Nazarene  Prophet !  Clearly 
here  was  a  man  whose  presumptuous  honesty  would  neither  be  bullied 
into  suppression  nor  corrupted  into  a  lie.  He  was  quite  impracticable. 
So,  since  authority,  threats,  blandishments  had  all  failed,  they  broke 
into  abuse.  "  Thou  art  His  disciple :  we  are  the  disciples  of  Moses ;  of 
this  man  we  know  nothing."  "  Strange,"  he  replied,  '•  that  you  should 
know  nothing  of  a  man  who  yet  has  wrought  a  miracle  such  as  not 
even  Moses  ever  wrought ;  and  we  know  that  neither  He  nor  any  one 
else  could  have  done  it,  unless  He  were  from  God."  What !  shades  of 
Hillel  and  of  Shammai !  was  a  mere  blind  beggar,  a  natural  ignorant 
heretic,  altogether  born  in  sins,  to  be  teaching  them !  Unable  to 
control  any  longer  their  transport  of  indignation,  they  flung  him  out 
of  the  hall,  and  out  of  the  synagogue. 

But  Jesus  did  not  neglect  his  first  confessor.  He,  too,  in  all 
probability  had,  either  at  this  or  some  previous  time,  been  placed 
under  the  ban  of  lesser  excommunication,  or  exclusion  from  the 
synagogue ;  for  we  scarcely  ever  again  read  of  His  re-entering  any  of 
those  synagogues  which,  during  the  early  years  of  His  ministry,  had 
been  His  favourite  places  of  teaching  and  resort.  He  sought  out  and 
found  the  man,  and  asked  him,  "  Dost  thou  believe  on  the  Son  of 
God  ?  "  "Why,  who  is  He,  Lord,"  answered  the  man,  "  that  I  should 
believe  on  Him  ?  " 

"  Thou  hast  both  seen  Him,  and  it  is  He  who  talketh  with  thee." 

"  Lord,  I  believe,"  he  answered ;  and  he  did  him  reverence. 

It  must  have  been  shortly  after  this  time  that  our  Lord  pointed 
the  contrast  between  the  different  effects  of  His  teaching — they  who 
saw  not,  made  to  see ;  and  those  who  saw,  made  blind.  The  Pharisees, 
ever  restlessly  and  discontentedly  hovering  about  Him,  and  in  their 
morbid  egotism  always  on  the  look-out  for  some  reflection  on  them- 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  273 

selves,  asked  "  if  they  too  were  blind.'*  The  answer  of  Jesus  was, 
that  in  natural  blindness  there  would  have  boen  no  guilt,  but  to  those 
who  only  stumbled  in  the  blindness  of  wilful  error  a  claim  to  the 
possession  of  sight  was  a  solf-condemnation. 

And  when  the  leaders,  the  teachers,  the  guides  were  blind,  how 
could  the  people  see  ? 

The  thought  naturally  led  Him  to  the  nature  of  true  and  false 
teachers,  which  He  expanded  and  illustrated  in  the  beautiful  apologue 
— half  parable,  half  allegory — of  the  True  and  the  False  Shepherds. 
He  told  them  that  He  was  the  Good  Shepherd,  who  laid  down 
His  life  for  the  sheep ;  while  the  hireling  shepherds,  flying  from 
danger,  betrayed  their  flocks.  He,  too,  was  that  door  of  the 
sheepfold,  by  which  all  His  true  predecessors  alone  had  entered, 
while  all  the  false — from  the  first  thief  who  had  climbed  into  God's 
fold — had  broken  in  some  other  way.  And  then  He  told  them  that  of 
His  own  free  will  He  would  lay  down  His  life  for  the  sheep,  both  of 
this  and  of  His  other  flocks,  and  that  of  His  own  power  He  would  take 
it  again.  But  all  these  divine  mysteries  were  more  than  they  could 
understand ;  and  while  some  declared  that  they  were  the  nonsense  of 
one  who  had  a  devil  and  was  mad,  others  could  only  plead  that  they 
were  not  like  the  words  of  one  who  had  a  devil,  and  that  a  devil  could 
not  have  opened  the  eyes  of  the  blind. 

Thus,  with  but  little  fruit  for  them,  save  the  bitter  fruit  of  anger 
and  hatred,  ended  the  visit  of  Jesus  to  the  Feast  of  Tabernacles.  And 
since  His  very  life  was  now  in  danger,  He  withdrew  once  more  from 
Jerusalem  to  Galilee,  for  one  brief  visit  before  He  bade  to  His  old  homo 
His  last  farewell. 


2M  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

CHAPTER  XLII. 

FAREWELL    TO    GALILEE. 

IMMEDIATELY  after  the  events  just  recorded,  St.  John  narrates  another 
incident  which  took  place  two  months  subsequently,  at  the  winter 
Feast  of  Dedication.  In  accordance  with  the  main  purpose  of  his 
Gospel,  which  was  to  narrate  that  work  of  the  Christ  in  Judsea,  and 
especially  in  Jerusalem,  which  the  Synoptists  had  omitted,  he  says 
nothing  of  an  intermediate  and  final  visit  to  Galilee,  or  of  those  last 
journeys  to  Jerusalem,  respecting  parts  of  which  the  other  Evangelists 
supply  us  with  so  many  details.  And  yet  that  Jesus  must  have 
returned  to  Galilee  is  clear,  not  only  from  the  other  Evangelists,  but 
also  from  the  nature  of  the  case  and  from  certain  incidental  facts  in 
the  narrative  of  St.  John  himself. 

It  is  well  known  that  the  whole  of  one  great  section  in  St.  Luke — 
from  ix.  51  to  xviii.  15 — forms  an  episode  in  the  Gospel  narrative  of 
which  many  incidents  are  narrated  by  this  Evangelist  alone,  and  in 
which  the  few  identifications  of  time  and  place  all  point  to  one  slow 
and  solemn  progress  from  Galilee  to  Jerusalem  (ix.  51 ;  xiii.  22  ;  xvii. 
11 ;  x.  38).  Now  after  the  Feast  of  Dedication  our  Lord  retired  into 
Persea,  until  He  was  summoned  thence  by  the  death  of  Lazarus 
(John  x.  40,  42 ;  xi.  1 — 46) ;  after  the  resurrection  of  Lazarus,  He 
fled  to  Ephraim  (xi.  54) ;  and  He  did  not  leave  Hia  retirement 
at  Ephraim  until  he  went  to  Bethany,  six  days  before  His  final  Pass- 
over (xii.  1). 

This  great  journey,  therefore,  from  Galilee  to  Jerusalem,  so  rich  in 
occasions  which  called  forth  some  of  His  most  memorable  utterances, 
must  have  been  either  a  journey  to  the  Feast  of  Tabernacles  or  to  tho 
Feast  of  Dedication.  That  it  could  not  have  been  the  former  may  bo 
regarded  as  settled,  not  only  on  other  grounds,  but  decisively  because 
that  was  a  rapid  and  a  secret  journey,  this  an  eminently  public  and 
leisurely  one. 

Almost  every  inquirer  seems  to  differ  to  a  greater  or  less  degree  as 
to  the  exact  sequence  and  chronology  of  tho  events  which  follow. 
Without  entering  into  minute  and  tedious  disquisitions  where  absolute 
certainty  is  impossible,  I  will  narrate  this  period  of  our  Lord's  life  in 
the  order  whicb,  after  repeated  study  of  the  Gospels,  appears  to  me  to 
be  tho  most  probable,  and  in  the  separate  details  of  which  I  have 


THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  275 

found  myself  again  and  again  confirmed  by  the  conclusions  of  other 
independent  inquirers.     And  here  I  will  only  premise  my  conviction — 

1.  That  the  episode  of  St.  Luke  up  to  xviii.  30,  mainly  refers  to  a 
single  journey,  although  unity  of  subject,  or  other  causes,  may  have 
led  the   sacred  writer   to  weave   into   his  narrative  some  events  or 
utterances  which  belong  to  an  earlier  or  later  epoch. 

2.  That  the  order  of  the  facts  narrated  even  by  St.  Luke  alone  is 
not,  and  does  not  in  any  way  claim  to  be,  strictly  chronological;  so 
that  the  place  of  any  event  in  the  narrative  by  no  means  necessarily 
indicates  its  true  position  in  the  order  of  time. 

3.  That  this   journey    is  identical  with    that    which   is    partially 
recorded  in  Matt,  xviii.  1 — xx.  16  ;  Mark  x.  1 — 31. 

4.  That  (as  seems  obvious  from  internal    evidence)    the  events 
narrated  in  Matt.  xx.  17—28 ;  Mark  x.  32—45  ;  Luke  xviii.  31—34, 
belong  not  to  this  journey,  but  to  the  last  which  Jesus  ever  took — the 
journey  from  Ephraim  to  Bethany  and  Jerusalem. 

Assuming  these  conclusions  to  be  justified — and  I  believe  that  they 
will  commend  themselves  as  at  least  probable  to  any  who  really  study 
the  data  of  the  problem — we  naturally  look  to  see  if  there  are  any 
incidents  which  can  only  be  referred  to  this  last  residence  of  Jesus  in 
Galilee  after  the  Feast  of  Tabernacles.  The  sojourn  must  have  been  a 
very  brief  one,  and  seems  to  have  had  no  other  object  than  that  of 
preparing  for  the  Mission  of  the  Seventy,  and  inaugurating  the  final 
proclamation  of  Christ's  kingdom  throughout  all  that  part  of  the  Holy 
Land  which  had  as  yet  been  least  familiar  with  His  word  and  works. 
His  instructions  to  the  Seventy  involved  His  last  farewell  to  Galilee, 
and  the  delivery  of  those  instructions  synchronised,  in  all  probability, 
with  His  actual  departure.  But  there  are  two  other  incidents  recorded 
in  the  13th  chapter,  which  probably  belong  to  the  same  brief  sojourn 
— namely,  the  news  of  a  Galilrean  massacre,  and  the  warning  which  He 
received  of  Herod's  designs  against  His  life. 

The  home  of  Jesus  during  these  few  last  days  would  naturally  be 
at  Capernaum,  His  own  city ;  and  while  He  was  there  organising  a 
solemn  departure  to  which  there  would  be  no  return,  there  were  some 
who  came  and  announced  to  Him  a  recent  instance  of  those  numerous 
disturbances  which  marked  the  Procuratorship  of  Pontius  Pilate.  Of 
the  particular  event  to  which  they  alluded  nothing  further  is  known ; 
and  that  a  few  turbulent  zealots  should  have  been  cut  down  at  Jeru- 
salem by  the  Roman  garrison  was  too  common-place  an  event  in  these 
troublous  times  to  excite  more  than  a  transient  notice.  There  were 

x  2 


276  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

probably  hundreds  of  such,  outbreaks  of  which  Josephus  has  pre- 
served no  record.  The  inflammable  fanaticism  of  the  Jews  at  this 
epoch — the  restless  hope  which  were  constantly  kindling  them  to 
f  nry  against  the  Roman  governor,  and  which  made  them  the  ready 
dupes  of  every  false  Messiah — had  necessitated  the  construction  of  the 
Tower  of  Antonia,  which  flung  its  threatening  shadow  over  the 
Temple  itself.  This  tower  communicated  with  the  Temple  by  a  flight 
of  steps,  so  that  the  Roman  legionaries  could  rush  down  at  once,  and 
suppress  any  of  the  disturbances  which  then,  as  now,  endangered  the 
security  of  Jerusalem  at  the  recurrence  of  every  religious  feast.  And 
of  all  the  Jews,  the  Galilasans,  being  the  most  passionately  turbulent 
and  excitable,  were  the  most  likely  to  suffer  in  such  collisions.  Indeed 
the  main  fact  which  seems  in  this  instance  to  have  struck  the  nar- 
rators, was  not  so  much  the  actual  massacre  as  the  horrible  incident 
that  the  blood  of  these  murdered  rioters  had  been  actually  mingled 
with  the  red  streams  that  flowed  from  the  victims  they  had  been 
offering  in  sacrifice.  And  those  who  brought  the  news  to  Christ  did 
so,  less  with  any  desire  to  complain  of  the  sanguinary  boldness  of  tho 
Roman  Governor,  than  with  a  curiosity  about  the  supposed  crimes 
which  must  have  brought  upon  these  slaughtered  worshippers  so 
hideous  and  tragical  a  fate. 

The  Book  of  Job  stood  in  Hebrew  literature  as  an  eternal  witness 
against  these  sweeping  deductions  of  a  confident  uncharity ;  but  the 
spirit  of  Eliphaz,  and  Zophar,  and  Bildad  still  survived,  and  our  Lord 
on  every  occasion  seized  the  opportunity  of  checking  and  reproving  it. 
"  Do  ye  imagine,"  He  said,  "  that  these  Galiloeans  were  sinners  above 
all  the  Galilseans,  because  they  suffered  such  things  ?  I  tell  you, 
Nay  :  but,  except  ye  repent,  ye  shall  all  likewise  perish."  And  then 
He  reminded  them  of  another  recent  instance  of  sudden  death,  in 
which  "  the  Tower  in  Siloam "  had  fallen,  and  crushed  eighteen 
people  who  happened  to  be  under  it ;  and  He  told  them  that  so  far 
from  these  poor  sufferers  having  been  specially  criminal,  they  should 
all,  if  they  did  not  repent,  be  involved  in  a  similar  destruction.  No 
doubt,  the  main  lesson  which  Christ  desired  to  teach,  was  that  every 
circumstance  of  life,  and  every  violence  of  man,  was  not  the  result 
cither  of  idle  accident  or  direct  retribution,  but  formed  part  of  one 
great  scheme  of  Providence  in  which  man  is  permitted  to  recognise 
the  one  prevailing  law — viz.,  that  the  so-called  accidents  of  life  happen 
alike  to  all,  but  that  all  should  in  due  time  receive  according  to  their 
works.  But  His  words  had  also  a  more  literal  fulfilment;  and, 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHltlST.  277 

doubtless,  there  may  have  been  some  among  His  hearers  who  lived  to 
call  them  to  mind  when  the  Jewish  race  was  being  miserably  decimated 
by  the  sword  of  Titus,  and  the  last  defenders  of  Jerusalem,  after 
deluging  its  streets  with  blood,  fell  crushed  among  the  flaming  ruins 
of  the  Temple,  which  not  even  their  lives  could  save. 

The  words  were  very  stern  :  but  Christ  did  not  speak  to  them  in 
the  language  of  warning  only ;  He  held  out  to  them  a  gracious  hope. 
Once,  and  again,  and  yet  again,  the  fig-tree  nr'ght  be  found  a  barren 
cumberer  of  the  ground,  but  there  was  ONE  to  intercede  for  it  still ; 
and  even  yet — though  now  the  axe  was  uplifted,  nay,  though  it  was  at 
its  backmost  poise — even  yet,  if  at  the  last  the  tree,  so  carefully  tended, 
should  bring  forth  fruit,  that  axe  should  be  stayed,  and  its  threatened 
stroke  should  not  rush  through  the  parted  air. 

Short  as  His  stay  at  His  old  home  was  meant  to  be,  His  enemies 
would  gladly  have  shortened  it  still  further.  They  were  afraid  of,  they 
were  weary  of,  the  Lord  of  Life.  Yet  they  did  not  dare  openly  to 
confess  their  sentiments.  The  Pharisees  came  to  Him  in  sham  soli- 
citude for  His  safety,  and  said,  "  Get  thee  out,  and  depart  hence ;  for 
Herod  is  wanting  to  kill  thee." 

Had  Jesus  yielded  to  fear — had  He  hastened  His  departure  in  con- 
sequence of  a  danger,  which  even  if  it  had  any  existence,  except  in 
their  own  imaginations,  had  at  any  rate  no  immediate  urgency — doubt- 
less, they  would  have  enjoyed  a  secret  triumph  at  His  expense.  But 
His  answer  was  supremely  calm  :  "  Go,"  He  said,  "  and  tell  this  fox, 
Behold,  I  am  casting  out  devils,  and  working  cures  to-day  and 
to-morrow,  and  on  the  third  my  work  is  done."  And  then  He 
adds,  with  the  perfect  confidence  of  security  mingled  with  the 
bitter  irony  of  sorrow,  "But  I  must  go  on  my  course  to-day,  and 
to-morrow,  and  the  day  following ;  for  it  cannot  be  that  a  prophet 
perish  out  of  Jerusalem."  And,  perhaps,  at  this  sorrowful  crisis  His 
oppressed  feelings  may  have  found  vent  in  some  pathetic  cry  over  the 
fallen  sinful  city,  so  red  with  the  blood  of  her  murdered  messengers, 
like  that  which  He  also  uttered  when  He  wept  over  it  on  the  summit 
of  Olivet. 

The  little  plot  of  these  Pharisees  had  entirely  failed.  Whether 
Herod  had  really  entertained  any  vague  intention  of  seeing  Jesus 
and  putting  him  to  death  as  he  had  put  to  death  his  kinsman  John,  or 
whether  the  whole  rumour  was  a  pure  invention,  Jesus  regarded  it 
with  consummate  indifference.  Whatever  Herod  might  be  designing, 
His  own  intention  was  to  finish  his  brief  stay  in  Galilee  in  his  own 


278  THE    LIFE    OF    CHRIST. 

due  time,  and  not  before.  A  day  or  two  yet  remained  to  Him  in 
which  He  would  continue  to  perform  His  works  of  mercy  on  all  who 
sought  Him ;  after  that  brief  interval  the  time  would  have  come  when 
He  should  be  received  up,  and  He  would  turn  His  back  for  the  last 
time  on  the  home  of  His  youth,  and  "set  His  face  steadfastly  to  go 
to  Jerusalem."  Till  then — so  they  must  tell  their  crafty  patron,  whom 
they  themselves  resembled — He  was  under  an  inviolable  protection, 
into  which  neither  their  malice  nor  his  cruelty  could  intrude. 

And  he  deservedly  bestowed  on  Herod  Antipas  the  sole  word  of 
pure  unmitigated  contempt  which  is  ever  recorded  to  have  passed  His 
lips.  Words  of  burning  anger  He  sometimes  spoke — words  of  scath- 
ing indignation — words  of  searching  irony — words  of  playful  humour ; 
but  some  are  startled  to  find  him  using  words  of  sheer  contempt.  Yet 
why  not  ?  there  can  be  no  noble  soul  which  is  wholly  destitute  of 
scorn.  The  "  scorn  of  scorn  "  must  exist  side  by  side  with  the  "  love 
of  love."  Like  anger,  like  the  power  of  moral  indignation,  scorn  has 
its  due  place  as  a  righteous  function  in  the  economy  of  human 
emotions,  and  as  long  as  there  are  things  of  which  we  rightly  judge 
as  contemptible,  so  long  must  contempt  remain.  And  if  ever  there 
was  a  man  who  richly  deserved  contempt,  it  was  the  paltry,  perjured 
princeling — false  to  his  religion,  false  to  his  nation,  false  to  his 
friends,  false  to  his  brethren,  false  to  his  wife — to  whom  Jesus  gave 
the  name  of  "this  fox."  The  inhuman  vices  which  the  Caesars  dis- 
played on  the  vast  theatre  of  their  absolutism — the  lust,  the  cruelty, 
the  autocratic  insolence,  the  ruinous  extravagance — all  these  were 
seen  in  pale  reflex  in  these  little  Neros  and  Caligulas  of  the  provinces 
— these  local  tyrants,  half  Idumaean,  half  Samaritan,  who  aped  the 
worst  degradations  of  the  Imperialism  to  which  they  owed  their  very 
existence.  Judaea  might  well  groan  under  the  odious  and  petty 
despotism  of  these  hybrid  Herodians — jackals  who  fawned  about  the 
feet  of  the  Ceesarean  lions.  Respect  for  "the  powers  that  be"  can 
hardly,  as  has  well  been  said,  involve  respect  for  all  the  impotences 
and  imbecilities. 

Whether  "  this  fox  "  ever  heard  the  manner  in  which  our  Lord  had 
characterised  him  and  his  dominion  we  do  not  know  ;  in  lifetime  they 
never  met,  until,  on  the  morning  of  the  crucifixion,  Antipas  vented 
upon  Jesus  his  empty  insults.  But  now  Jesus  calmly  concluded 
His  last  task  in  Galilee.  He  summoned  His  followers  together, 
and  out  of  them  chose  seventy  to  prepare  His  way.  Their  number 
was  probably  symbolic,  and  the  mission  of  so  largo  a  number  to  go 


TIIE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  279 

before  Him  two  and  two,  and  prepare  for  His  arrival  in  every  place 
which  He  intended  to  visit,  implies  for  this  last  journey  of  proclama- 
tion an  immense  publicity.  The  instructions  which  He  gave  them 
closely  resemble  those  which  he  had  issued  to  the  Twelve  ;  and,  indeed, 
differ  from  them  only  in  being  more  brief,  becaiise  they  refer  to  a  more 
transitory  office  ;  in  omitting  the  now  needless  restriction  about  not 
visiting  the  Gentiles  and  Samaritans  ;  and  perhaps  in  bestowing  upon 
them  less  ample  miraculous  power.  They  also  breathe  a  sadder  tone, 
inspired  by  the  experience  of  incessant  rejection. 

And  now  the  time  has  come  for  Him  to  set  forth,  and  it  must  be  in 
sorrow.  He  left,  indeed,  some  faithful  hearts  behind  Him ;  but  how 
few  !  Galilee  had  rejected  Him,  as  Judaea  had  rejected  Him.  On  one 
side  of  the  lake  which  He  loved,  a  whole  populace  in  unanimous  depu- 
tation had  besought  Him  to  depart  out  of  their  coasts ;  on  the  other, 
they  had  vainly  tried  to  vex  His  last  days  among  them  by  a  miserable 
conspiracy  to  frighten  Him  into  flight.  At  Nazareth,  the  sweet  moun- 
tain village  of  His  childish  days — at  Nazareth,  with  all  its  happy 
memories  of  His  boyhood  and  His  mother's  home — they  had  treated 
Him  with  such  violence  and  outrage,  that  He  could  not  visit  it  again. 
And  even  ai  Chorazin,  and  Capernaum,  and  Bethsaida — on  those  Eden- 
shores  of  the  silver  lake — in  the  green  delicious  plain,  whose  every 
field  He  had  traversed  with  His  apostles,  performing  deeds  of  mercy, 
and  uttering  words  of  love — even  there  they  loved  the  whited  sepul- 
chres of  a  Pharisaic  sanctity,  and  the  shallow  traditions  of  a  Levitical 
ceremonial  better  than  the  light  and  the  life  which  had  been  offered 
them  by  the  Son  of  God.  They  were  feeding  on  ashes;  a  deceived 
heart  had  turned  them  aside.  On  many  a  great  city  of  antiquity,  on 
Nineveh  and  Babylon,  on  Tyre  and  Sidon,  on  Sodom  and  Gomorrah, 
had  fallen  the  wrath  of  God  ;  yet  even  Nineveh  and  Babylon  would 
have  humbled  their  gorgeous  idolatries,  even  Tyre  and  Sidon  have 
turned  from  their  greedy  vanities,  yea,  even  Sodom  and  Gomorrah 
would  have  repented  from  their  filthy  lusts,  had  they  seen  the  mighty 
works  which  had  been  done  in  these  little  cities  and  villages  of  the 
Galil Bean  sea.  And,  therefore,  "  Woe  unto  thec,  Chorazin!  woe  unto- 
thee,  Bethsaida  !  "  and  unto  thee,  Capernaum,  "His  own  city,"  a  yet 
deeper  woe  ! 

With  such  thoughts  in  His  heart,  and  such  words  on  His  lips,  he 
started  forth  from  the  scene  of  His  rejected  ministry ;  and  on  all  this 
land,  and  most  of  all  on  that  region  of  it,  the  woe  has  fallen.  Exquisite 
still  in  its  loveliness,  it  is  now  desolate  and  dangerous.  The  birds  still 


280  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

sing  in  countless  myriads;  the  water-fowl  still  play  on  tbe  crystal 
mere ;  the  brooks  flow  into  it  from  the  neighbouring  hill,  "  filling  their 
bosoms  with  pearl,  and  scattering  their  path  with  emeralds ;  "  the 
aromatic  herbs  are  still  fragrant  when  the  foot  crushes  them,  and  the 
tall  oleanders  fill  the  air  with  their  delicate  perfume  as  of  old ;  but 
the  vineyards  and  fruit-gardens  have  disappeared ;  the  fleets  and 
fishing-boats  cease  to  traverse  the  lake  ;  the  hum  of  men  is  silent ;  the 
stream  of  prosperous  commerce  has  ceased  to  flow.  The  very  names 
and  sites  of  the  towns  and  cities  are  forgotten ;  and  where  they  once 
shone  bright  and  populous,  flinging  their  shadows  across  the  sunlit 
waters,  there  are  now  grey  mounds  where  even  the  ruins  are  too 
ruinous  to  be  distinguishable.  One  solitary  palm-tree  by  one  squalid 
street  of  huts,  degraded  and  frightful  beyond  any,  even  in  Palestine, 
still  marks  the  site,  and  recalls  the  name  of  the  one  little  town  where 
lived  that  sinful  penitent  woman  who  once  washed  Christ's  feet  with 
her  tears,  and  wiped  them  with  the  hairs  of  her  head. 

And  the  very  generation  which  rejected  Him  was  doomed  to  recall 
in  bitter  and  fruitless  agony  these  peaceful  happy  days  of  the  Son  of 
Man.  Thirty  years  had  barely  elapsed  when  the  storm  of  Roman 
invasion  burst  furiously  over  that  smiling  land.  He  who  will,  may 
read  in  the  Jewish  "War  of  Josephus  the  hideous  details  of  the  slaughter 
which  decimated  the  cities  of  Galilee,  and  wrung  from  the  historian 
the  repeated  confession  that  "  it  was  certainly  God  who  brought  the 
Romans  to  punish  the  Galilooans,"  and  exposed  the  people  of  city  after 
city  "  to  be  destroyed  by  their  bloody  enemies."  Immediately  after 
the  celebrated  passage  in  which  he  describes  the  lake  and  plain  of 
Gennesareth  as  "  the  ambition  of  nature,"  follows  a  description  of  that 
terrible  sea-fight  on  these  bright  waters,  in  which  the  number  of  the 
slain,  including  those  killed  in  the  city,  was  six  thousand  five  hundred. 
Hundreds  were  stabbed  by  the  Romans  or  run  through  with  poles ; 
others  tried  to  save  their  lives  by  diving,  but  if  once  they  raised  their 
heads  were  slain  by  darts  ;  or  if  they  swam  to  the  Roman  vessels  had 
their  heads  or  hands  lopped  off  ;  while  others  were  chased  to  the  land 
and  there  massacred.  "  One  might  then,"  the  historian  continues, 
"  see  the  lake  all  bloody,  and  full  of  dead  bodies,  for  not  one  of  them 
escaped.  And  a  terrible  stink,  and  a  very  sad  sight  there  was,  on  the 
following  days  over  that  country;  for,  as  for  the  shores,"they  were  full  of 
shipwrecks  and  of  dead  lodies  all  swelled  ;  and  as  the  dead  bodies  were 
inflamed  by  the  sun,  and  putrefied,  they  corrupted  the  air,  insomuch 
that  the  misery  was  not  only  an  object  of  commiseration  to  the  Jeivs,  but 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  281 

even  to  those  that  hated  them,  and  had  been  the  authors  of  that  misery." 
Of  those  that  died  amid  this  butchery  :  of  those  whom  Vespasian 
immediately  afterwards  abandoned  to  brutal  and  treacherous  massacre 
between  Tarichece  and  Tiberias ;  of  those  twelve  hundred  "  old  and 
useless  "  whom  he  afterwards  caused  to  be  slain  in  the  stadium ;  of 
the  six  thousand  whom  he  sent  to  aid  Nero  in  his  attempt  to  dig 
through  the  isthmus  of  Athos ;  of  the  thirty  thousand  four  hundred 
whom  he  sold  as  slaves — may  there  not  have  been  many  who  in  their 
agony  and  exile,  in  their  hour  of  death  and  day  of  judgment,  recalled 
Him  whom  they  had  repudiated,  and  remembered  that  the  sequel  of 
all  those  gracious  words  which  had  proceeded  out  of  His  lips  had  been 
the  "  wo'e  "  which  their  obduracy  called  forth. 

There  could  not  but  be  sorrow  in  such  a  parting  from  such  a  scene. 
And  yet  the  divine  spirit  of  Jesus  could  not  long  be  a  prey  to  con- 
suming sadness.  Out  of  the  tenebrous  influences  cast  about  it  from 
the  incessant  opposition  of  unbelief  and  sin,  it  was  ever  struggling  into 
the  purity  and  peace  of  heaven,  from  the  things  seen  and  temporal  to 
the  things  unseen  and  eternal,  from  the  shadows  of  human  degrada- 
tion into  the  sunlight  of  God's  peace.  "  In  that  hour  Jesus  rejoiced  in 
spirit,"  and  what  a  joy ;  what  a  boundless,  absorbing  exultation,  as 
He  thought  no  longer  of  judgment  but  of  compassion  ;  as  He  turned 
not  with  faint  trust  but  perfect  knowledge  to  "  the  larger  hope ; "  as 
He  remembered  how  that  which  was  hidden  from  the  wise  and  prudent 
had  been  revealed  unto  babes  ;  as  He  dwelt  upon  the  thought  that  He 
was  sent  not  to  the  rich  and  learned  few,  but  to  the  ignorant  and 
suffering  many ;  as  He  told  His  disciples,  that  into  His,  yea,  into  His 
own  loving  hands,  had  His  Father  committed  all  power,  and  that  in 
Him  they  would  see  and  know  the  spirit  of  His  Father,  and  thereby 
might  see  and  know  that  revelation  for  which  many  kings  and 
prophets  had  sighed  in  vain.  And  then,  that  even  in  the  hour  of 
denunciation  not  one  of  them  might  doubt  His  own  or  His  Father's  love, 
He  uttered,  in  that  same  hour  of  rapt  and  exalted  ecstacy,  those  ten- 
derest  words  ever  uttered  in  human  language  as  God's  message  and 
invitation  to  His  children  in  the  suffering  family  of  man,  "  Come  unto 
me  all  ye  that  labour  and  are  heavy  laden,  and  I  will  give  you  rest. 
Take  my  yoke  upon  you,  and  learn  of  me  :  for  I  am  meek  and  lowly  in 
heart ;  and  ye  shall  find  rest  unto  your  souls." 

So,  over  a  temporary  sorrow  there  triumphed  an  infinite  and 
eternal  joy.  There  are  some  who  have  dwelt  too  exclusively  on  Jesus 
as  the  Man  of  Sorrows  ;  have  thought  of  His  life  as  of  one  unmitigated 


282  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

suffering,  one  almost  unbroken  gloom.  Bat  in  the  Bible — though 
there  alone — we  find  the  perfect  compatibility,  nay,  the  close  union  of 
joy  with  sorrow :  and  myriads  of  Christians  who  have  been  "  troubled 
on  every  side,  yet  not  distressed  ;  perplexed,  but  not  in  despair  ;  per- 
secuted, but  not  forsaken  ;  cast  down,  but  not  destroyed,"  can  under- 
stand how  the  Man  of  Sorrows,  even  in  the  days  of  His  manhood,  may 
have  lived  a  life  happier,  in  the  true  sense  of  happiness — happier, 
because  purer,  more  sinless,  more  faithful,  more  absorbed  in  the  joy 
of  obedience  to  His  Heavenly  Father — than  has  been  ever  granted  to 
the  sons  of  men.  The  deep  pure  stream  flows  on  its  way  rejoicing, 
even  though  the  forests  overshadow  it,  and  no  transient  sunshine 
flickers  on  its  waves. 

And  if,  indeed,  true  joy — the  highest  joy — be  "  severe,  and  chaste 
and  solitary,  and  incompatible,"  then  how  constant,  how  inexpressible, 
what  a  joy  of  Grod,  must  have  been  the  joy  of  the  Man  Christ  Jesus, 
who  came  to  give  to  all  who  love  Him,  henceforth  and  for  ever,  a  joy 
which  no  man  taketh  from  them — a  joy  which  the  world  can  neither 
give  nor  take  away. 


CHAPTER    XLIII. 

INCIDENTS   OF  THE   JODKNEY. 

WE  are  not  told  the  exact  route  taken  by  Jesus  as  He  left  Gcnnesa- 
reth  ;  but  as  He  probably  avoided  Nazareth,  with  its  deeply  happy 
and  deeply  painful  memories,  He  may  have  crossed  the  bridge  at  the 
southern  extremity  of  the  Lake,  and  so  got  round  into  the  plain  of 
Esdraelon  either  by  the  valley  of  Bethshean,.  or  over  Mount  Tabor  and 
round  Little  Hermon,  passing  Endor  and  Nain  and  Shunem  on  His 
way. 

Crossing  the  plain,  and  passing  Taanach  and  Megiddo,  He  would 
reach  the  range  of  hills  which  form  the  northern  limit  of  Samaria ; 
and  at  the  foot  of  their  first  ascent  lies  the  little  town  of  En-gannim,  or 
the  "  Fountain  of  Gardens."  This  would  be  the  first  Samaritan 
village  at  which  He  would  arrive,  and  hither,  apparently,  He  had  sent 
two  messengers  "  to  make  ready  for  Him."  Although  the  incident  is 


THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  283 

mentioned  by  St.  Luke  before  the  Mission  of  the  Seventy,  yet  that  is 
probably  due  to  his  subjective  choice  of  order,  and  we  may  suppose 
that  there  were  two  of  the  seventy  who  were  dispatched  to  prepare 
the  way  for  Him  spiritually  as  well  as  in  the  more  ordinary  sense ; 
unless,  indeed,  we  adopt  the  conjecture  that  the  messengers  may  have 
been  James  and  John,  who  would  thus  be  likely  to  feel  with  special 
vividness  the  insult  of  His  rejection.  At  any  rate  the  inhabitants — 
who  to  this  day  are  not  remarkable  for  their  civility  to  strangers — 
absolutely  declined  to  receive  or  admit  Him.  Previously  indeed,  when 
He  was  passing  through  Samaria  on  His  journey  northwards,  He  had 
found  Samaritans  not  only  willing  to  receive,  but  anxious  to  detain 
His  presence  among  them,  and  eager  to  listen  to  His  words.  But  now 
in  two  respects  the  circumstances  were  different ;  for  now  He  was 
professedly  travelling  to  the  city  which  they  hated  and  the  Temple 
which  they  despised,  and  now  he  was  attended,  not  by  a  few  Apostles, 
but  by  a  great  multitude,  who  were  accompanying  Him  as  their 
acknowledged  Prophet  and  Messiah.  Had  Gerizim  and  not  Jerusalem 
been  the  goal  of  His  journey,  all  might  have  been  different ;  but  now 
His  destination  and  His  associates  inflamed  their  national  animosity 
too  much  to  admit  of  their  supplying  to  the  weary  pilgrims  the 
ordinary  civilities  of  life.  And  if  the  feelings  of  this  little  frontier 
village  of  En-gammin  were  so  unmistakably  hostile,  it  became  clear 
that  any  attempt  to  journey  through  the  whole  breadth  of  Samaria, 
and  even  to  pass  under  the  shadow  of  their  rival  sanctuary,  would  bt 
a  dangerous  if  not  a  hopeless  task.  Jesus  therefore  altered  the  course 
of  His  journey,  and  turned  once  more  towards  the  Jordan  valley. 
Rejected  by  Galilee,  refused  by  Samaria,  without  a  word  He  bent  His 
stops  towards  Peraea. 

But  the  deep  discouragement  of  this  refusal  to  receive  Him  was 
mingled  in  the  minds  of  James  and  John  with  hot  indignation.  There 
is  nothing  so  trying,  so  absolutely  exasperating,  as  a  failure  to  find 
food  and  shelter,  and  common  civility,  after  the  fatigue  of  travel,  and 
especially  for  a  large  multitude  to  begin  a  fresh  journey  when  they 
expected  rest.  Full,  therefore,  of  the  Messianic  kingdom,  which  now 
at  last  they  thought  was  on  the  eve  of  being  mightily  proclaimed,  the 
two  brothers  wanted  to  usher  it  in  with  a  blaze  of  Sinaitic  vengeance, 
and  so  to  astonish  and  restore  the  flagging  spirits  of  followers  who 
would  naturally  be  discouraged  by  so  immediate  and  decided  a  repulse. 
"  Lord,  wilt  Thou  that  we  command  fire  to  come  down  from  heaven, 
and  consume  them,  even  as -Elias  did?"  "What  wonder,"  says  St. 


234  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

Ambrose,  "that  the  Sons  of  Thunder  wished  to  flash  lightning?" 
And  this  their  fiery  impetuosity  seemed  to  find  its  justification  not 
only  in  the  precedent  of  Elijah's  conduct,  but  in  the  fact  that  it  had 
been  displayed  in  this  very  country  of  Samaria.  Was  it  more  neces- 
sary in  personal  defence  of  a  single  prophet  than  to  vindicate  the 
honour  of  the  Messiah  and  His  attendants  ?  But  Jesus  turned  and 
rebuked  them.  God's  heaven  has  other  uses  than  for  thunder. 
"  They  did  not  know,"  He  told  them,  "  what  spirit  they  were  of." 
They  had  not  realised  the  difference  which  separated  Sinai  and  Carmel 
from  Calvary  and  Hermon.  He  had  come  to  save,  not  to  destroy ; 
and  if  any  heard  His  words  and  believed  not,  He  judged  them  not. 
And  so,  without  a  word  of  anger,  He  went  to  a  different  village ;  and 
doubtless  St.  John,  who  by  that  time  did  know  of  what  spirit  he  was, 
remembered  these  words  of  Christ  when  he  went  with  Peter  into 
Samaria  to  confirm  the  recent  converts,  and  to  bestow  upon  them  the 
gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost. 

Perhaps  it  may  have  been  on  this  occasion — for  certainly  no 
occasion  would  have  been  more  suitable  than  that  furnished  by  this 
early  and  rude  repulse — that  Jesus,  turning  to  the  great  multitudes 
that  accompanied  Him,  delivered  to  them  that  memorable  discourse  in 
which  He  warned  them  that  all  who  would  bo  His  disciples  must 
come  to  Him,  not  expecting  earthly  love  or  acceptance,  but  expecting 
alienation  and  opposition,  and  counting  the  cost.  They  must  abandon, 
if  need  be,  every  earthly  tie ;  they  must  sit  absolutely  loose  to  the 
interests  of  the  world  ;  they  must  take  tip  the  cross  and  follow  Him. 
Strange  language,  of  which  it  was  only  afterwards  that  they  learnt  the 
full  significance !  For  a  man  to  begin  a  tower  which  he  could  not  finish 
— for  a  king  to  enter  on  a  war  in  which  nothing  was  possible  save 
disaster  and  defeat — involved  disgrace  and  indicated  folly ;  better  not 
to  follow  Him  at  all,  unless  they  followed  Him  prepared  to  forsake  all 
that  they  had  on  earth ;  prepared  to  sacrifice  the  interests  of  time, 
and  to  live  solely  for  those  of  eternity.  One  who  believed  not,  would 
indeed  suffer  loss  and  harm,  yet  his  lot  was  less  pitiable  than  that  of 
him  who  became  a  disciple  only  to  be  a  backslider — who,  facing  both 
ways,  cast  like  Lot's  wife  a  longing  glance  on  all  that  he  ought  to 
flee — who  made  the  attempt,  at  once  impotent  and  disastrous,  to  serve 
both  God  and  Mammon. 

As  both  Galilee  and  Samaria  were  now  closed  to  Him,  He  could 
only  journey  on  His  way  to  Peraea,  down  the  valley  of  Bethshean, 
between  the  borders  of  both  provinces.  There  a  very  touching  incident 


TUB    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  .  283 

occurred.  On  the  outskirts  of  one  of  the  villages  a  dull,  harsh,  plain- 
tive cry  smote  His  ears,  and  looking  up  He  saw  "  ten  men  who  were 
lepers,"  united  in  a  community  of  deadly  misery.  They  were  afar  off, 
for  they  dared  not  approach,  since  their  approach  was  pollution,  and 
they  were  obliged  to  warn  away  all  who  would  have  come  near  them 
by  the  heart-rending  cry,  "Tame!  tamS !  " — "Unclean!  Unclean!" 
There  was  something  in  that  living  death  of  leprosy — recalling  as  it 
did  the  most  frightful  images  of  suffering  and  degradation,  corrupting 
as  it  did  the  very  fountains  of  the  life-blood  of  man,  distorting  his 
countenance,  rendering  loathsome  his  touch,  slowly  encrusting  and 
infecting  him  with  a  plague-spot  of  disease  far  more  horrible  than 
death  itself — which  always  seems  to  have  thrilled  the  Lord's  heart 
with  a  keen  and  instantaneous  compassion.  And  never  more  so  than 
at  this  moment.  Scarcely  had  He  heard  their  piteous  cry  of  "  Jesus, 
Master,  have  mercy  on  us,"  than  instantly,  without  sufficient  pause 
even  to  approach  them  more  nearly,  He  called  aloud  to  them,  "  Go, 
show  yourselves  unto  the  priests."  They  knew  the  significance  of 
that  command  :  they  knew  that  it  bade  them  hurry  off  to  claim  from 
the  priests  the  recognition  of  their  cure,  the  certificate  of  their  restitu- 
tion to  every  rite  and  privilege  of  human  life.  Already,  at  the  sound 
of  that  potent  voice,  they  felt  a  stream  of  wholesome  life,  of  recovered 
energy,  of  purer  blood,  pulsing  through  their  veins  ;  and  as  they  went 
they  were  cleansed. 

He  who  has  not  seen  the  hideous,  degraded  spectacle  of  the  lepers 
clamorously  revealing  their  mutilations,  and  almost  demanding  alms, 
by  the  roadside  of  some  Eastern  city,  can  hardly  conceive  how 
transcendent  and  immeasurable  was  the  boon  which  they  had  thus 
received  at  the  hands  of  Jesus.  One  would  have  thought  that  they 
would  have  suffered  no  obstacle  to  hinder  the  passionate  gratitude 
which  should  have  prompted  them  to  hasten  back  at  once  —  to 
struggle,  if  need  be,  even  through  fire  and  water,  if  thereby  they 
could  fling  themselves  with  tears  of  heartfelt  acknowledgment  at 
their  Saviour's  feet,  to  thank  Him  for  a  gift  of  something  more 
precious  than  life  itself.  What  absorbing  selfishness,  what  Jewish 
infatuation,  what  sacerdotal  interference,  what  new  and  worse  leprosy  of 
shameful  thanklessness  and  superstitious  ignorance,  prevented  it  ? 
We  do  not  know.  We  only  know  that  of  ten  who  were  healed  but 
one  returned,  and  he  was  a  Samaritan.  On  the  frontiers  of  the  two 
countries  had  been  gathered,  like  froth  at  the  margin  of  wave  and 
sand,  the  misery  of  both ;  but  while  the  nine  Jews  were  infamously 


286  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

thankless,  the  one  Samaritan  "  turned  back,  and  with  a  loud  voice 
glorified  God,  and  fell  down  on  his  face  at  His  feet,  giving  Him 
thanks."  The  heart  of  Jesus,  familiar  as  He  was  with  all  ingratitude, 
was  yet  moved  by  an  instance  of  it  so  flagrant,  so  all  but  unanimous, 
and  so  abnormal.  "  Were  not  the  ten  cleansed  ?  "  He  asked  in 
sorrowful  surprise ;  "  but  the  nine — where  are  they  ?  There  are  not 
found  that  returned  to  give  glory  to  God  save  this  alien."  "  It  is," 
says  Lange,  "as  if  all  these  benefits  were  falling  into  a  deep  silent 
grave."  The  voice  of  their  misery  had  awaked  the  instant  echo  of 
His  mercy ;  but  the  miraculous  utterance  of  His  mercy,  though  it 
thrilled  through  their  whole  physical  being,  woke  no  echo  of  gratitude 
in  their  earthly  and  still  leprous  hearts. 

But,  nevertheless,  this  alien  shall  not  have  returned  in  vain,  nor 
shall  the  rare  virtue — alas,  how  rare  a  virtue  ! — of  his  gratitude  go 
unrewarded.  Not  his  body  alone,  but  the  soul — whose  value  was  so 
infinitely  more  precious,  jusb  as  its  diseases  are  so  infinitely  more 
profound — should  be  hdaled  by  his  Saviour's  word. 

"  Arise  and  go,"  said  Jesus  ;  "  thy  faith  hath  saved  thee." 


CHAPTER  XLTV. 

TEACHINGS   OF  THE   JOURNET. 

Kvnx  during  this  last  journey  our  Lord  did  not  escape  the  taunts,  the 
opposition,  the  depreciating  remarks — in  one  word,  the  Pharisaism — 
of  the  Pharisees  and  those  who  resembled  them.  The  circumstances 
which  irritated-  them  against  Him  were  exactly  the  same  as  they  had 
been  throughout  his  whole  career — exactly  those  in  which  His  example 
was  most  lofty,  and  His  teaching  most  beneficial — namely,  the  per- 
formance on  the  Sabbath  of  works  of  mercy,  and  the  association  with 
publicans  and  sinners. 

One  of  these  sabbatical  disputes  occurred  in  a  synagogue.  Jesns, 
ns  we  have  already  remarked,  whether  because  of  the  lesser  excommu- 
nication (the  cherem),  or  for  any  other  reason,  seems,  during  this  latter 
period  of  His  ministry,  to  have  entered  the  synagogues  but  rarely. 
The  exclusion,  however,  from  one  synagogue  or  more  did  not  include  a 


THE   LIFE    OF  CUBIST.  287 

prohibition  to  enter  any  synagogue ;  and  the  subsequent  conduct  of 
this  rosh  liakkeneseth  seems  to  show  that  he  had  a  certain  awe  of  Jesus, 
mingled  with  his  jealousy  and  suspicion.  On  this  day  there  sat  among 
the  worshippers  a  poor  woman  who,  for  eighteen  long  years,  had  been 
bent  double  by  "  a  spirit  of  infirmity,"  and  could  not  lift  herself  up. 
The  compassionate  heart  of  Jesus  could  not  brook  the  mute  appeal  of 
her  presence.  He  called  her  to  Him,  and  saying  to  her,  "  Woman 
thou  art  loosed  from  thine  infirmity,"  laid  His  hands  on  her.  Instantly 
she  experienced  the  miraculous  strengthening  which  enabled  her  to 
lift  up  the  long-bowed  and  crooked  frame,  and  instantly  she  broke  into 
utterances  of  gratitude  to  God.  But  her  strain  of  thanksgiving  was 
interrupted  by  the  narrow  and  ignorant  indignation  of  the  ruler  of  the 
synagogue.  Here,  under  his  very  eyes,  and  without  any  reference  to 
the  "  little  brief  authority  "  which  gave  him  a  sense  of  dignity  on  each 
recurring  Sabbath,  a  woman — a  member  of  his  congregation — had 
actually  had  the  presumption  to  be  healed.  Armed  with  his  favourite 
"  texts,"  and  in  all  the  fussiness  of  official  hypocrisy,  he  gets  up  and 
rebukes  the  perfectly  innocent  multitude,  telling  them  it  was  a  gross 
instance  of  sabbath-breaking  for  them  to  be  healed  on  that  sacred  day, 
when  they  might  just  as  well  be  healed  on  any  of  the  other  six  days  of 
the  week.  That  the  offence  consisted  solely  in  the  being  healed  is 
clear,  for  he  certainly  could  not  mean  that,  if  they  had  any  sickness,  it 
was  a  crime  for  them  to  come  to  the  synagogue  at  all  on  the  Sabbath 
day.  Now,  as  the  poor  woman  does  not  seem  to  have  spoken  one 
word  of  entreaty  to  Jesus,  or  even  to  have  called  His  attention  to  her 
case,  the  utterly  senseless  address  of  this  man  could  only  by  any  pos- 
sibility mean  either  "  You  sick  people  must  not  come  to  the  synagogue 
at  all  on  the  Sabbath  under  present  circumstances,  for  fear  you  should 
be  led  into  Sabbath-breaking  by  having  a  miraculous  cure  performed 
upon  you  ;  "  or  "  If  any  one  wants  to  heal  you  on  a  Sabbath,  you  must 
decline."  And  these  remarks  he  has  neither  the  courage  to  address  to 
Jesus  Himself,  nor  the  candour  to  address  to  the  poor  healed  woman, 
but  preaches  at  them  both  by  rebuking  the  multitude,  who  had  no 
concern  in  the  action  at  all,  beyond  the  fact  that  they  had  been  passive 
spectators  of  it ! 

The  whole  range  of  the  Gospels  does  not  supply  any  other  instance 
of  an  interference  so  illogical,  or  a  stupidity  so  hopeless ;  and  the 
indirect,  underhand  way  in  which  he  gave  vent  to  his  outraged  igno- 
rance brought  on  him  that  expression  of  our  Lord's  indignation  which 
he  had  not  dared  openly  to  brave.  "Hypocrite!"  was  the  one  crushing 


2SS  TEE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

word  with  which  Jesus  addressed  him.  This  silly  official  had  been 
censorious  with  Him  because  He  had  spoken  a  few  words  to  the 
woman,  and  laid  upon  her  a  healing  hand ;  and  with  the  woman 
because,  having  been  bent  double,  she  lifted  herself  up  and  glorified 
God  !  It  would  be  difficult  to  imagine  such  a  paralysis  of  the  moral 
sense,  if  we  did  not  daily  see  the  stultifying  effect  produced  upon  the 
intellect  by  the  "  deep  slumber  of  a  decided  opinion,"  especially  when 
the  opinion  itself  rests  upon  nothing  better  than  a  meaningless  tra- 
dition. Now  Jesus  constantly  varied  the  arguments  and  appeals  by 
which  He  endeavoured  to  show  the  Pharisees  of  His  nation  that  their 
views  about  the  Sabbath  only  degraded  it  from  a  divine  benefit  into  a 
revolting  bondage.  To  the  Rabbis  of  Jerusalem  He  justified  Himself 
by  an  appeal  to  His  own  character  and  authority,  as  supported  by  the 
triple  testimony  of  John  the  Baptist,  of  the  Scriptures,  and  of  tho 
Father  Himself,  who  bore  witness  to  Him  by  the  authority  which  He 
had  given  Him.  To  the  Pharisees  of  Galilee  He  had  quoted  the  direct 
precedents  of  Scripture,  or  had  addressed  an  appeal,  founded  on  their 
own  common  sense  and  power  of  insight  into  the  eternal  principles  of 
things.  But  the  duller  and  less  practised  intellects  of  these  Peraans 
might  not  have  understood  either  the  essential  love  and  liberty  implied 
by  the  institution  of  the  Sabbath,  or  the  paramount  authority  of  Jesus 
as  Lord  of  the  Sabbath.  It  could  not  rise  above  the  cogency  of  the 
argumentum  ad  hominem.  It  was  only  capable  of  a  conviction  based  on 
their  own  common  practices  and  received  limitations.  There  was  not 
one  of  them  who  did  not  consider  himself  justified  in  unloosing  and 
leading  to  the  water  his  ox  or  his  ass  on  the  Sabbath,  although  that 
involved  far  more  labour  than  either  laying  the  hand  on  a  sick 
woman,  or  even  being  healed  by  a  miraculous  word!  If  their 
Sabbath  rules  gave  way  to  the  needs  of  ox  or  ass,  ought  they  not  to 
give  way  to  the  cruel  necessities  of  a  daughter  of  Abraham  ?  If  they 
mi^ht  do  much  more  labour  on  the  Sabbath  to  abbreviate  a  few  hours' 
thirst,  might  not  He  do  much  less  to  terminate  a  Satanically  cruel 
bondage  which  had  lasted,  lo !  these  eighteen  years  ?  At  reasonings 
so  unanswerable,  no  wonder  that  His  adversaries  were  ashamed,  and 
that  the  simpler,  more  unsophisticated  people  rejoiced  at  all  tho 
glorious  acts  of  mercy  which  He  wrought  on  their  behalf. 

Again  and  again  was  our  Lord  thus  obliged  to  redeem  this  great 
primeval  institution  of  God's  love  from  these  narrow,  formal,  per- 
nicious restrictions  of  an  otiose  and  unintelligent  tradition.  But  it  is 
evident  that  He  attached  as  much  importance  to  the  noble  and  loving 


THE    LIFE    OF    CHRIST.  289 

freedom  of  the  day  of  rest  as  they  did  to  the  stupefying  inaction  tc 
which  they  had  reduced  the  normal  character  of  its  observance.  Their 
absorbing  attachment  to  it,  the  frenzy  which  filled  them  when  He  set 
at  nought  their  Sabbatarian  uncharities,  rose  from  many  circum- 
stances. They  were  wedded  to  the  religious  system  which  had  long 
prevailed  among  them,  because  it  is  easy  to  be  a  slave  to  the  letter, 
and  difficult  to  enter  into  the  spirit ;  easy  to  obey  a  number  of  out- 
ward rules,  difficult  to  enter  intelligently  and  self-sacrifioingly  into 
the  will  of  God;  easy  to  entangle  the  soul  in  a  network  of  petty 
observances,  difficult  to  yield  the  obedience  of  an  enlightened  heart ; 
easy  to  be  haughtily  exclusive,  difficult  to  be  humbly  spiritual ;  easy 
to  be  an  ascetic  or  a  formalist,  difficult  to  be  pure,  and  loving,  and 
wise,  and  free ;  easy  to  be  a  Pharisee,  difficult  to  be  a  disciple ;  very 
easy  to  embrace  a  self -satisfy  ing  and  sanctimonious  system  of  rabbin- 
ical observances,  very  difficult  to  love  God  with  all  the  heart,  and  all 
the  might,  and  all  the  soul,  and  all  the  strength.  In  laying  His  axe 
at  the  root  of  their  proud  and  ignorant  Sabbatarianism,  He  was 
laying  His  axe  at  the  root  of  all  that  "  miserable  micrology  "  which 
they  had  been  accustomed  to  take  for  their  religious  life.  Is  the  spirit 
of  the  sects  so  free  in  these  days  from  Pharisaic  taint  as  not  to  need 
such  lessons  ?  Will  not  these  very  words  which  I  have  written — 
although  they  are  but  an  expansion  of  the  lessons  which  Jesus  inces- 
santly taught — yet  give  offence  to  some  who  read  them  ? 

One  more  such  incident  is  recorded — the  sixth  embittered  contro- 
versy of  the  kind  in  which  they  had  involved  our  Lord.  Nothing  but 
Sabbatarianism  which  had  degenerated  into  monomania  could  account 
for  their  so  frequently  courting  a  controversy  which  always  ended  in 
their  total  discomfiture.  On  a  certain  Sabbath,  which  was  the  principal 
day  for  Jewish  entertainments,  Jesus  was  invited  to  the  house  of  one 
who,  as  he  is  called  a  ruler  of  the  Pharisees,  must  have  been  a  man  in 
high  position,  and  perhaps  even  a  member  of  the  Sanhedrin.  The 
invitation  was  one  of  those  to  which  He  was  so  often  subjected,  not 
respectful  or  generous,  but  due  either  to  idle  curiosity  or  downright 
malice.  Throughout  the  meal  He  was  carefully  watched  by  hostile 
scrutiny.  The  Pharisees,  as  has  been  well  said,  "  performed  the  duty 
of  religious  espionage  with  exemplary  diligence."  Among  the  nn- 
bidden  guests  who,  Oriental  fashion,  stood  about  the  room  and  looked 
on,  as  they  do  to  this  day  during  the  continuance  of  a  meal,  was  a 
man  afflicted  with  the  dropsy.  The  prominent  position  in  which  he 
stood,  combined  with  the  keen  watchfulness  of  the  Pharisees,  seems  to 


290  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

show  that  lie  had  been  placed  there  designedly,  either  to  test  Christ's 
willingness  to  respect  their  Sabbath  prejudices,  or  to  defeat  His 
miraculous  power  by  the  failure  to  cure  a  disease  more  inveterate,  and 
less  amenable  to  curative  measures,  -than  any  other.  If  so,  this  was 
another  of  those  miserable  cases  in  which  these  unfeeling  teachers  of 
the  people  were  ready  to  make  the  most  heart-rending  shame  or  the 
deepest  misery  a  mere  tool  to  be  used  or  thrown  aside,  as  chance 
might  serve,  in  their  dealings  with  Jesus.  But  this  time  Jesus  antici- 
pated, and  went  to  meet  half  way  the  subtle  machinations  of  this 
learned  and  distinguished  company.  He  asked  them  the  very  simple 
question — 

"  Is  it  lawful  to  heal  on  the  Sabbath  day  ?  "  They  would  not  say 
"Yes;"  but,  on  the  other  hand,  they  dared  not  say  "No!"  Had  it 
been  unlawful,  it  was  their  positive  function  and  duty  to  say  so  then 
and  there,  and  without  any  subterfuge  to  deprive  the  poor  sufferer,  so 
far  as  in  them  lay,  of  the  miraculous  mercy  which  was  prepared  for 
him,  and  to  brave  the  consequences.  If  they  dared  not  say  so — either 
for  fear  of  the  people,  or  for  fear  of  instant  refutation,  or  because  the 
spell  of  Christ's  awful  ascendancy  was  upon  them,  or  out  of  a  mere 
splenetic  pride,  or — to  imagine  better  motives — because  in  their 
inmost  hearts,  if  any  spot  remained  in  them  uncrusted  by  idle  and 
irreligious  prejudices,  they  felt  that  it  was  lawful,  and  more  than 
lawful,  EIGHT — then,  by  their  own  judgment,  they  left  Jesus  free  to 
heal  without  the  possibility  of  censure.  Their  silence,  therefore,  was, 
even  on  their  own  showing,  and  on  their  own  principles,  His  entire 
justification.  His  mere  simple  question,  and  their  inability  to  answer 
it,  was  an  absolute  decision  of  the  controversy  in  His  favour.  He 
therefore  took  the  man,  healed  him,  and  let  him  go. 

And  then  He  appealed,  as  before,  to  their  own  practice.  "Which 
of  you  shall  have  a  son,  or  (even)  an  ox,  fallen  into  a  pit,  and  will  not 
straightway  pull  him  out  on  the  Sabbath  day?"  They  knew  that 
they  could  only  admit  the  fact,  and  then  the  argument  a  fortiori  was 
irresistible ;  a  man  was  more  important  than  a  beast ;  the  extrication 
of  a  beast  involved  more  labour  by  far  than  the  healing  of  a  man. 
Their  base  little  plot  only  ended  in  the  constrained  and  awkward 
silence  of  a  complete  refutation  which  they  were  too  ungenerous  to 
acknowledge. 

Jesus  deigned  no  farther  to  dwell  on  a  subject  which  to  the  mind 
of  every  candid  listener  had  been  set  at  rest  for  ever,  and  He  turned 
their  thoughts  to  other  lessons.  The  dropsy  of  their  inflated  self- 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  291 

satisfaction  was  a  disease  far  more  difficult  to  heal  than  that  of  the 
sufferer  whom  they  had  used  to  entrap  Him.  Scarcely  was  the  feast 
ready,  when  there  arose  among  the  distinguished  company  one  of 
those  unseemly  struggles  for  precedence  which — common,  nay,  almost 
universal  as  they  are — show  the  tendencies  of  human  nature  on  its 
weakest  and  most  contemptible  side.  And  nothing  more  clearly 
showed  the  essential  hollowness  of  Pharisaic  religion  than  its  in- 
tense pride  and  self-exaltation.  Let  one  anecdote  suffice.  The  King 
Janneeus  had  on  one  occasion  invited  several  Persian  Satraps,  and 
among  the  guests  asked  to  meet  them  was  the  Rabbi  Simeon  Ben 
Shetach.  The  latter  on  entering  seated  himself  at  table  between  the 
King  and  the  Queen.  Being  asked  his  reason  for  such  a  presump- 
tuous intrusion,  he  replied  that  it  was  written  in  the  Book  of  Jesus 
Ben  Sirach,  "  Exalt  wisdom  and  she  shall  exalt  thee,  and  shall  make 
thee  sit  among  princes." 

The  Jews  at  this  period  had  adopted  the  system  of  triclinia  from 
the'Sreeks  and  Romans,  and  the  "  chief  seat "  (7rp(i)TOK\urui)  was  the 
middle  seat  in  the  central  triclinium.  Observing  the  anxiety  of  each 
guest  to  secure  this  place  for  himself,  our  Lord  laid  down  a  wiser  and 
better  principle  of  social  courtesy,  which  involved  the  far  deeper 
lesson  of  spiritual  humility.  Just  as  in  earthly  society  the  pushing, 
intrusive,  self-conceited  man  must  be  prepared  for  many  a  strong 
rebuff,  and  will  find  himself  often  compelled  to  give  place  to  modest 
merit,  so  in  the  eternal  world,  "  whosoever  exalte th  himself  shall  be 
abased,  and  he  that  humbleth  himself  shall  be  exalted."  Pride,  exclu- 
siveness,  self-glorification,  have  no  place  in  the  kingdom  of  God. 
Humility  is  the  only  passport  which  can  obtain  for  us  an  entrance 

there. 

"  Hnmble  we  must  be,  if  to  heaven  we  go  ; 
High  is  the  roof  there,  but  the  gate  is  low." 

And  He  proceeded  to  teach  them  another  lesson,  addressed  to  some 
obvious  foible  in  the  character  of  His  host.  Luxury,  ostentation,  the 
hope  of  a  return,  are  not  true  principles  of  hospitality.  A  richer 
recompense  awaits  the  kindness  bestowed  upon  the  poor  than  the 
adulatory  entertainment  of  the  friendly  and  the  rich.  In  receiving 
friends  and  relatives,  do  not  forget  the  helpless  and  the  afflicted. 
Interested  beneficence  is  nothing  in  the  world  but  a  deceitful  selfish- 
ness. It  may  be  that  thou  wouldest  have  won  a  more  eternal  blessing 
if  that  dropsical  man  had  been  invited  to  remain — if  those  poor 
lookers-on  were  counted  among  the  number  of  the  guests. 

U  2 


292  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

At  this  point  one  of  the  guests,  perhaps  because  he  thought  that 
these  lessons  were  disagreeable  and  severe,  interposed  a  remark  which, 
under  the  circumstances,  rose  very  little  above  the  level  of  a  vapid  and 
misleading  platitude.  He  poured  upon  the  troubled  waters  a  sort  of 
general  impersonal  aphorism.  Instead  of  profiting  by  these  Divine 
lessons,  he  seemed  inclined  to  rest  content  with  "an  indolent  remission 
of  the  matter  into  distant  futurity,"  as  though  he  were  quite  sure  of 
that  blessedness,  of  which  he  seems  to  have  a  very  poor  and  material 
conception.  But  our  Lord  turned  his  idle  poor  remark  into  a  fresh 
occasion  for  most  memorable  teaching.  He  told  them  a  parable  to 
show  that  "  to  eat  bread  in  the  kingdom  of  heaven  "  might  involve 
conditions  which  those  who  felt  so  very  sure  of  doing  it  would  not  be 
willing  to  accept.  He  told  them  of  a  king  who  had  sent  out  many 
invitations  to  a  great  banquet,  but  who,  when  the  due  time  came,  was 
met  by  general  refusals.  One  had  his  estate  to  manage,  and  was 
positively  obliged  to  go  and  see  a  new  addition  to  it.  Another  was 
deep  in  buying  and  selling,  and  all  the  business  it  entailed.  A  third 
was  so  lapped  in  contented  domesticity  that  his  coming  was  out  of  the 
question.  Then  the  king,  rejecting,  in  his  anger,  these  disrespectful 
and  dilatory  guests,  bade  his  slaves  go  at  once  to  the  broad  and  narrow 
streets,  and  bring  in  the  poor  and  maimed,  and  lame  and  blind ;  and 
when  that  was  done,  and  there  still  was  room,  he  sent  them  to  urge  in 
even  the  houseless  wanderers  by  the  hedges  and  the  roads.  The 
application  to  all  present  was  obvious.  The  worldly  heart — whether 
absorbed  in  the  management  of  property,  or  the  acquisition  of  riches, 
or  the  mere  sensualisms  of  contented  comfort — was  incompatible  with 
any  desire  for  the  true  banquet  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven.  The 
Gentile  and  the  Phariath,  the  harlot  and  the  publican,  the  labourer  of 
the  roadside  and  the  beggar  of  the  streets,  these  might  be  there  in 
greater  multitudes  than  the  Scribe  with  his  boasted  learning,  and 
the  Pharisee  with  his  broad  phylactery.  "  For  I  say  unto  you,"  Ho 
added  in  His  own  person,  to  point  the  moral  more  immediately  to  their 
own  hearts,  "  that  none  of  those  men  who  were  called  shall  taste  of  my 
supper."  It  was  the  lesson  which  He  so  often  pointed.  "  To  be 
invited  is  one  thing,  to  accept  the  invitation  is  another.  Many  are 
called,  but  few  are  chosen.  Many — as  the  heathen  proverb  said — 
'  Many  bear  the  narthex,  but  few  feel  the  inspiring  god '  Tro\\ol  rot 

VO.p0TJKO<j>6pOl  TTCtVpOl  Se  TC  ^UK^Oi" 

Teachings  like  these  ran  throughout  this  entire  period  of  the 
Lord's  ministry.  The  parable  just  recorded  was,  in  its  far-sided  and 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  293 

many-reaching  significance,  a  reproof  not  only  to  the  close  exclusive- 
ness  of  the  Pharisees,  but  also  to  their  worldliness  and  avarice.  On 
another  occasion,  when,  our  Lord  was  mainly  teaching  His  own  dis- 
ciples, He  told  thetn  the  parable  of  the  Unjust  Steward,  to  snow  them 
the  necessity  of  care  and  faithfulness,  of  prudence  and  wisdom,  in  so 
managing  the  affairs  and  interests  and  possessions  of  this  life  as  not  to 
lose  hereafter  their  heritage  of  the  eternal  riches.  It  was  impossible 
— such  was  the  recurrent  burden  of  so  many  discourses — to  be  at  once 
worldly  and  spiritual ;  to  be  at  once  the  slave  of  God  and  the  slave  of 
Mammon.  With  the  supreme  and  daring  paradox  which  impressed 
His  divine  teaching  on  the  heart  and  memory  of  the  world,  He  urged 
them  to  the  foresight  of  a  spiritual  wisdom  by  an  example  drawn  from 
the  foresight  of  a  criminal  cleverness. 

Although  Christ  had  been  speaking  in  the  first  instance  to  the 
Apostles,  some  of  the  Pharisees  seem  to  have  been  present  and  to  have 
heard  Him  ;  and  it  is  a  characteristic  fact  that  this  teaching,  more  than 
any  other,  seems  to  have  kindled  their  most  undisguised  derision. 
They  began  to  treat  Him  with  the  most  open  and  insolent  disdain. 
And  why  ?  Because  they  were  Pharisees,  and  yet  were  fond  of  money. 
Had  not  they,  then,  in  their  own  persons,  successfully  solved  the 
problem  of  "making  the  best  of  both  worlds?"  Who  could  doubt 
their  perfect  safety  for  the  future  ?  nay,  the  absolute  certainty  that 
they  would  be  admitted  to  the  "  chief  seats,"  the  most  distinguished 
and  conspicuous  places  in  the  world  to  come  ?  Were  they  not,  then, 
standing  witnesses  of  the  absurdity  of  the  supposition  that  the  love  of 
money  was  incompatible  with  the  love  of  God  ? 

Oar  Lord's  answer  to  them  is  very  much  compressed  by  St.  Luke, 
but  consisted,  first,  in  showing  them  that  respectability  of  life  is  one 
thing,  and  sincerity  of  heart  quite  another.  Into  the  new  kingdom, 
for  which  John  had  prepared  the  way,  the  world's  lowest  were  pressing 
in,  and  were  being  accepted  before  intern ;  the  Gospel  was  being  rejected 
by  them,  though  it  was  not  the  destruction,  but  the  highest  fulfilment 
of  the  Law.  Nay — such  seems  to  be  the  meaning  of  the  apparently 
disconnected  verse  which  follows — even  to  the  Law  itself,  of  which 
not  one  tittle  should  fail,  they  were  faithless,  for  they  could  connive  at 
the  violation  of  its  most  distinct  provisions.  In  this  apparently  isolated 
remark  He  alluded,  in  all  probability,  to  their  relations  to  Herod 
Antipas,  whom  they  were  content  to  acknowledge  and  to  flatter,  and 
to  whom  not  one  of  them  had  dared  to  use  the  bravo  language  of 
reproach  which  had  been  used  by  John  the  Baptist,  although,  by  the 


294  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

clearest  decisions  of  the  Law  which  they  professed  to  venerate,  his 
divorce  from  the  daughter  of  Aretas  was  adulterous,  and  his  marriage 
with  Herodias  was  doubly  adulterous,  and  worse. 

But  to  make  the  immediate  truth  which  He  had  been  explaining 
yet  more  clear  to  them,  He  told  them  the  parable  of  the  Rich  Man  and 
Lazarus.  Like  all  of  our  Lord's  parables,  it  is  full  of  meaning,  and 
admits  of  more  than  one  application ;  but  at  least  they  could  not  miss 
the  one  plain  and  obvious  application,  that  the  decision  of  the  next 
world  will  often  reverse  the  estimation  wherein  men  are  held  in  this ; 
that  God  is  no  respecter  of  persons;  that  the  heart  must  make  its 
choice  between  the  "  good  things  "  of  this  life  and  those  which  the 
externals  of  this  life  do  not  affect.  And  What  may  be  called  the 
epilogue  of  this  parable  contains  a  lesson  more  solemn  still — namely, 
that  the  means  of  grace  which  God's  mercy  accords  to  every  living 
soul  are  ample  for  its  enlightenment  and  deliverance ;  that  if  these  be 
neglected,  no  miracle  will  be  wrought  to  startle  the  absorbed  soul  from 
its  worldly  interests  ;  that  "  if  they  hear  not  Moses  and  the  Prophets, 
neither  will  they  be  persuaded  though  one  rose  from  the  dead."  Auditu 
fideli  salvamur,  says  Bengel,  non  apparitionibus — "We  are  saved  by 
faithful  hearing,  not  by  ghosts." 

This  constant  reference  to  life  as  a  time  of  probation,  and  to  the 
Great  Judgment,  when  the  one  word  "Come,"  or  "Depart,"  as  uttered 
by  the  Judge,  should  decide  all  controversies  and  all  questions  for  ever, 
naturally  turned  the  thoughts  of  many  listeners  to  these  solemn  sub- 
jects. But  there  is  a  great  and  constant  tendency  in  the  minds  of  us 
all  to  refer  such  questions  to  the  case  of  others  rather  than  our  own — 
to  make  them  questions  rather  of  speculative  curiosity  than  of  practical 
import.  And  such  tendencies,  which  rob  moral  teaching  of  all  its 
wholesomeness,  and  turn  its  warnings  into  mere  excuses  for  uncharity, 
were  always  checked  and  discouraged  by  our  Lord.  A  special  oppor- 
tunity was  given  Him  for  this  on  $ne  occasion  during  those  days  in 
which  He  was  going  "  through  the  cities  and  villages,  teaching,  and 
journeying  toward  Jerusalem."  He  had — not,  perhaps,  for  the  first 
time — been  speaking  of  the  small  beginnings  and  the  vast  growth  of 
the  kingdom  of  heaven  alike  in  the  soul  and  in  the  world  ;  and  one  of 
His  listeners,  in  the  spirit  of  unwise  though  not  unnatural  curiosity, 
asked  Him,  "  Lord,  are  there  few  that  be  saved  ?  "  Whether  the 
question  was  dictated  by  secure  self-satisfaction,  or  by  despondent  pity, 
we  cannot  tell;  but  in  either  case  our  Lord's  answer  involved  a  dis- 
approval of  the  inquiry,  and  a  statement  of  the  wholly  different  manner 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHBIST.  205 

in  which  such  questions  should  be  approached.  "Few"  or  "many" 
are  relative  terms.  Waste  not  the  precious  opportunities  of  life  in  idle 
wonderment,  but  strive.  Through  that  narrow  gate,  none — not  were 
they  a  thousand  times  of  the  seed  of  Abraham — can  enter  without 
earnest  effort.  And  since  the  efforts,  the  wilful  efforts,  the  erring 
efforts  of  many  fail — since  the  day  will  come  when  the  door  shall  be 
shut,  and  it  shall  be  for  ever  too  late  to  enter  there — since  no  impas- 
sioned appeal  shall  then  admit,  no  claim  of  olden  knowledge  shall  then 
be  recognised — since  some  of  those  who  in  their  spiritual  pride  thought 
that  they  best  knew  the  Lord,  shall  hear  the  awful  repudiation,  "  I 
know  you  not" — strive  ye  to  be  of  those  that  enter  in.  For  many 
shall  enter  from  every  quarter  of  the  globe,  and  yet  thou,  0  son  of 
Abraham,  mayest  be  excluded.  And  behold,  once  more — it  may  well 
sound  strange  to  thee,  yet  so  it  is — "  there  are  last  which  shall  be  first, 
and  there  are  first  which  shall  be  last." 

Thus  each  vapid  interruption,  each  scornful  criticism,  each  erroneous 
question,  each  sad  or  happy  incident,  was  made  by  Jesus,  throughout 
this  journey,  an  opportunity  for  teaching  to  His  hearers,  and  through 
them  to  all  the  world,  the  things  that  belonged  unto  their  peace.  And 
He  did  so  once  more,  when  "  a  certain  lawyer  "  stood  up  tempting 
Him,  and  asked — not  to  obtain  guidance,  but  to  find  subject  for  objec- 
tion— the  momentous  question,  "What  must  I  do  to  obtain  eternal 
life?"  Jesus,  seeing  through  the  evil  motive  of  his  question,  simply 
asked  him  what  was  the  answer  to  that  question  which  was  given  in 
the  Law  which  it  was  the  very  object  of  the  man's  life  to  teach  and  to 
explain.  The  lawyer  gave  the  best  summary  which  the  best  teaching 
of  his  nation  had  by  this  time  rendered  prevalent.  Jesus  simply  con- 
firmed his  answer,  and  said,  "  This  do,  and  thou  shalt  live."  But 
wanting  something  more  than  this,  and  anxious  to  justify  a  question 
which  from  his  own  point  of  view  was  superfluous,  and  which  had,  as 
he  well  knew,  been  asked  with  an  ungenerous  purpose,  the  lawyer 
thought  to  cover  his  retreat  by  the  fresh  question,  "  And  who  is  my 
neighbour  ?  "  Had  Jesus  asked  the  man's  own  opinion  on  this  ques- 
tion, He  well  knew  how  narrow  and  false  it  would  have  been;  He 
therefore  answered  it  Himself,  or  rather  gave  to  the  lawyer  the  means 
for  answering  it,  by  one  of  His  most  striking  parables.  He  told 
him  how  once  a  man,  going  down  the  rocky  gorge  which  led  from 
Jerusalem  to  Jericho,  had  fallen  into  the  hands  of  the  robbers, 
whose  frequent  attacks  had  given  to  that  descent  the  ill-omened 
name  of  "  the  bloody  way,"  and  had  been  left  by  these  Bedawtn 


296  THE   LIFE    OF   CHKJST. 

marauders,  after  the  fashion  which  they  still  practise,  bleeding, 
naked,  and  half  dead  upon  the  road.  A  priest  going  back  to  his 
priestly  city  had  passed  that  way,  caught  a  glimpse  of  him,  and 
crossed  over  to  the  other  side  of  the  road.  A  Levite,  with  still 
cooler  indifference,  had  come  and  stared  at  him,  and  quietly  done 
the  same.  But  a  Samaritan  journeying  that  way — one  on  whom  he 
would  have  looked  with  shuddering  national  antipathy,  one  in  whose 
very  shadow  he  would  have  seen  pollution — a  good  Samaritan,  pattern 
of  that  Divine  Speaker  whom  men  rejected  and  despised,  but  who  had 
come  to  stanch  those  bleeding  wounds  of  humanity,  for  which 
there  was  no  remedy  either  in  the  ceremonial  or  the  moral  law — 
came  to  him,  pitied,  tended  him,  mounted  him  on  his  own  beast, 
trudged  beside  him  on  the  hard,  hot,  dusty,  dangerous  road,  and 
would  not  leave  him  till  he  had  secured  his  safety,  and  generously 
provided  for  his  future  wants.  Which  of  these  three,  Jesus  asked  the 
lawyer,  was  neighbour  to  him  who  fell  among  thieves  ?  The  man  was 
not  so  dull  as  to  refuse  to  see  ;  but  yet,  knowing  that  he  would  have 
excluded  alike  the  Samaritans  and  the  Gentiles  from  his  definition  of 
"  neighbours,"  he  has  not  the  candour  to  say  at  once,  "  The  Samaritan," 
but  uses  the  poor  periphrasis,  "  He  that  did  him  the  kindness."  "  Go," 
said  Jesus,  "  and  do  thou  likewise."  I,  the  friend  of  publicans  and 
sinners,  hold  up  the  example  of  this  Samaritan  to  thee. 

We  must  not,  however,  suppose  that  these  two  months  of  mission- 
progress  were  all  occupied  in  teaching,  which,  however  exalted,  received 
its  external  shape  and  impulse  from  the  errors  and  controversies  which 
met  the  Saviour  on  His  way.  There  were  many  circumstances  during 
these  days  which  must  have  filled  His  soul  with  joy. 

Pre-eminent  among  these  was  the  return  of  the  Seventy.  We 
cannot,  of  course,  suppose  that  they  returned  in  a  body,  but  that 
from  time  to  time,  two  and  two,  as  our  Lord  approached  the  various 
cities  and  villages  whither  He  had  sent  them,  they  came  to  give  Him 
an  account  of  their  success.  And  that  success  was  such  as  to  fill  their 
simple  hearts  with  astonishment  and  exultation.  "Lord,"  they  ex- 
claimed, "even  the  devils  are  subject  unto  us  through  Thy  name." 
Though  He  had  given  them  no  special  commission  to  heal  demoniacs, 
though  in  one  conspicuous  instance  even  the  Apostles  had  failed  in  this 
attempt,  yet  now  they  could  cast  out  devils  in  their  Master's  name.  Jesus, 
while  entering  into  their  joy,  yet  checked  the  tone  of  over-exultation, 
and  rather  turned  it  into  a  nobler  and  holier  channel.  He  bade  them 
feel  sure  that  good  was  eternally  mightier  than  evil ;  and  that  the 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  297 

victory  over  Satan — his  fall  like  lightning  from  heaven — had  been 
achieved  and  should  continue  for  ever.  Over  all  evil  influences  He 
gave  them  authority  and  victory,  and  the  word  of  His  promise  should 
be  an  amulet  to  protect  them  from  every  source  of  harm.  They 
should  go  upon  the  lion  and  adder,  the  young  lion  and  the  dragon 
should  they  tread  under  feet ;  because  He  had  set  His  love  upon  them, 
therefore  would  He  deliver  them :  He  would  set  them  up  because 
they  had  known  His  name.  And  yet  there  was  a  subject  of  joy  more 
deep  and  real  and  true — less  dangerous  because  less  seemingly  personal 
and  conspicuous  than  this — on  which  He  rather  fixed  their  thoughts  : 
it  was  that  their  names  had  been  written,  and  stood  unobliterated,  in 
the  Book  of  Life  in  heaven. 

And  besides  the  gladness  inspired  into  the  heart  of  Jesus  by  the 
happy  faith  and  unbounded  hope  of  His  disciples,  He  also  rejoiced  in 
spirit  that,  though  rejected  and  despised  by  Scribes  and  Pharisees,  He 
was  loved  and  worshipped  by  Publicans  and  Sinners.  The  poor  to 
whom  He  preached  His  Gospel — the  blind  whose  eyes  He  had  come  to 
open — the  sick  whom  He  had  come  to  heal — the  lost  whom  it  was 
His  mission  to  seek  and  save ; — these  all  thronged  with  heartfelt  and 
pathetic  gratitude  to  the  Good  Shepherd,  the  Great  Physician.  The 
Scribes  and  Pharisees  as  usual  murmured,  but  what  mattered  that  to 
the  happy  listeners?  To  the  weary  and  heavy-laden  He  spoke  in 
every  varied  form  of  hope,  of  blessing,  of  encouragement.  By  the 
parable  of  the  Importunate  Widow  He  taught  them  the  duty  of  faith, 
and  the  certain  answer  to  ceaseless  and  earnest  prayer.  By  the 
parable  of  the  haughty,  respectable,  fasting,  almsgiving,  self-satisfied 
Pharisee — who,  going  to  make  his  boast  to  God  in  the  Temple,  went 
home  less  justified  than  the  poor  Publican,  who  could  only  reiterate 
one  single  cry  for  God's  mercy  as  ho  stood  there  beating  his  breast, 
and  with  downcast  eyes — He  taught  them  that  God  loves  better  a 
penitent  humility  than  a  merely  external  service,  and  that  a  broken 
heart  and  a  contrite  spirit  were  sacrifices  which  He  would  not  despise. 
Nor  was  this  all.  He  made  them  feel  that  they  were  dear  to  God; 
that,  though  erring  children,  they  were  His  children  still.  And, 
therefore,  to  the  parables  of  the  Lost  Sheep  and  the  Lost  Drachma, 
He  added  that  parable  in  which  lies  the  whole  Gospel  in  its  richest  and 
tenderest  grace — the  Parable  of  the  Prodigal  Son. 

Never  certainly  in  human  language  was  so  much — such  a  world  of 
love  and  wisdom  and  tenderness — compressed  into  such  few  immortal 
words.  Every  line,  every  touch  of  the  picture  is  full  of  beautiful 


298  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

eternal  significance.  The  poor  boy's  presumptuous  claim  for  all  that 
life  could  give  him — the  leaving  of  the  old  home — the  journey  to  a 
far  country — the  brief  spasm  of  "enjoyment"  there — the  mighty 
famine  in  that  land — the  premature  exhaustion  of  all  that  could 
make  life  noble  and  endurable — the  abysmal  degradation  and  unutter- 
able misery  that  followed — the  coming  to  himself,  and  recollection  of 
all  that  he  had  left  behind — the  return  in  heart-broken  penitence  and 
deep  humility — the  father's  far-off  sight  of  him,  and  the  gush  of 
compassion  and  tenderness  over  this  poor  returning  prodigal — the 
ringing  joy  of  the  whole  household  over  him  who  had  been  loved  and 
lost,  and  had  now  come  home — the  unjust  jealousy  and  mean  com- 
plaint of  the  elder  brother — and  then  that  close  of  the  parable  in  a 
strain  of  music — "  Son,  thou  art  ever  with  me,  and  all  that  I  have  is 
thine.  It  was  meet  that  we  should  make  merry,  and  lie  glad :  for  this 
thy  brother  was  dead,  and  is  alive  again ;  was  lost,  and  is  found  " — all 
this  is  indeed  a  divine  epitome  of  the  wandering  of  man  and  the  love 
of  God,  such  as  no  literature  has  ever  equalled,  such  as  no  ear  of  man 
has  ever  heard  elsewhere.  Put  in  the  one  scale  all  that  Confucius,  or 
Sakya  Mouni,  or  Zoroaster,  or  Socrates  ever  wrote  or  said — and  they 
wrote  and  said  many  beautiful  and  holy  words — and  put  in  the  other 
the  Parable  of  the  Prodigal  Son  alone,  with  all  that  this  single  parable 
connotes  and  means,  and  can  any  candid  spirit  doubt  which  scale 
would  outweigh  the  other  in  eternal  preciousness — in  divine  adapta- 
tion to  the  wants  of  man  ? 

So  this  great  journey  grew  gradually  to  a  close.  The  awful 
solemnity — the  shadow,  as  it  were,  of  coming  doom — the  half -uttered 
"  too  late  "  which  might  be  dimly  heard  in  its  tones  of  warning — 
characterise  the  single  record  of  it  which  the  Evangelist  St.  Luke  has 
happily  preserved.  We  seem  to  hear  throughout  it  an  undertone  of 
that  deep  yearning  which  Jesus  had  before  expressed — "  I  have  A 
baptism  to  be  baptised  with ;  and  how  am  I  straitened  until  it  be 
accomplished !  "  It  was  a  sorrow  for  all  the  broken  peace  and  angry 
opposition  which  His  work  would  cause  on  earth — a  sense  that  He 
was  prepared  to  plunge  into  the  "willing  agony"  of  the  already 
kindled  flame.  And  this  seems  to  have  struck  the  minds  of  all  who 
heard  Him;  they  had  an  expectation,  fearful  or  glad  according  to  the 
condition  of  -their  consciences,  of  something  great.  Some  new  mani- 
festation— some  revelation  of  the  thoughts  of  men's  hearts — was  near 
at  hand.  At  last  the  Pharisees  summoned  up  courage  to  ask  Him 
"  When  the  kingdom  of  God  should  come  ?  "  There  was  a  certain 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  299 

impatience,  a  certain  materialism,  possibly  also  a  tinge  of  sarcasm  and 
depreciation  in  the  question,  as  though  they  had  said,  "  When  is  all 
this  preaching  and  preparation  to  end,  and  the  actual  time  to  arrive?" 
His  answer,  as  usual,  indicated  that  their  point  of  view  was  wholly 
mistaken.  The  coming  of  the  kingdom  of  God  could  not  be  ascer- 
tained by  the  kind  of  narrow  and  curious  watching  to  which  they 
were  addicted.  False  Christs  and  mistaken  Rabbis  might  cry  "  Lo 
here!  "  and  "Lo  there!"  but  that  kingdom  was  already  in  the  midst  of 
them ;  nay,  if  they  had  the  will  and  the  wisdom  to  recognise  and  to 
embrace  it,  that  kingdom  was  within  them.  That  answer  was  suffi- 
cient to  the  Pharisees,  but  to  His  disciples  He  added  words  which 
implied  the  fuller  explanation.  Even  they  did  not  fully  realise  that 
the  kingdom  had  already  come.  Their  eyes  were  strained  forward  in 
intense  and  yearning  eagerness  to  some  glorious  future ;  but  in  the 
future,  glorious  as  it  would  be,  they  would  still  look  backward  with 
yet  deeper  yearning,  not  unmingled  with  regret,  to  this  very  past — to 
these  days  of  the  Son  of  Man,  in  which  they  were  seeing  and  their 
hands  handling  the  "Word  of  Life.  In  those  days,  leathern  not  be 
deceived  by  any  "  Lo  there !  Lo  here  !  "  nor  let  them  w#ste  in  feverish 
and  fruitless  restlessness  the  calm  and  golden  opportunities  of  life. 
For  that  coming  of  the  Son  of  Man  should  be  bright,  sudden,  terrible, 
universal,  irresistible  as  the  lightning  flash ;  but  before  that  day  He 
must  suffer  and  be  rejected.  Moreover,  that  gleam  of  His  second 
advent  would  flame  upon  the  midnight  of  a  sensual,  unexpectant 
world,  as  the  flood  rolled  over  the  festive  sensualism  in  the  days  of 
Noah,  and  the  fire  and  brimstone  streamed  from  heaven  upon  the  glit- 
tering rottenness  of  the  Cities  of  the  Plain.  Woe  to  those  who  should 
in  that  day  be  casting  regretful  glances  on  a  world  destined  to  pass 
away  in  flame  !  For  though  till  then  the  business  and  companionships 
of  life  should  continue,  and  all  its  various  fellowships  of  toil  or  friend- 
liness, that  night  would  be  one  of  fearful  and  of  final  separations  ! 

The  disciples  were  startled  and  terrified  by  words  of  such  strange 
solemnity.  "Where,  Lord  ?"  they  ask  in  alarm.  But  to  the  "where" 
there  could  be  as  little  answer  as  to  the  "  when,"  and  the  coming  of 
God's  kingdom  is  as  little  geographical  as  it  is  chronological.  "Where- 
soever the  body  is,"  He  says,  "  thither  will  the  vultures  be  gathered 
together."  The  mystic  Armageddon  is  no  place  whose  situation  you 
may  fix  by  latitude  and  longitude.  Wherever  there  is  individual 
wickedness,  wherever  there  is  social  degeneracy,  wherever  there  is 
deep  national  corruption,  thither  do  the  eagle -avengers  of  the  Divine 


300  THE    LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

vengeance  wing  their  flight  from  far :  thither  from  the  ends  of  the 
earth  come  nations  of  a  fierce  countenance,  "  swift  as  the  eagle  flieth," 
to  rend  and  to  devour.  "  Her  young  ones  also  suck  up  blood :  and 
where  the  slain  are,  there  is  she."  Jerusalem— nay,  the  whole  Jewish 
nation — was  falling  rapidly  into  the  dissolution  arising  from  internal 
decay ;  and  already  the  flap  of  avenging  pinions  was  in  the  air.  When 
the  world  too  should  lie  in  a  state  of  morbid  infamy,  then  should  bo 
heard  once  more  the  rushing  of  those  "  congregated  wings." 

Is  not  all  history  one  long  vast  commentary  on  these  great  pro- 
phecies ?  In  the  destinies  of  nations  and  of  races  has  not  the  Christ 
returned  again  and  again  to  deliver  or  to  judge  ? 


CHAPTER   XLV. 

THE     FEAST    OF    DEDICATION. 

NOWHERE,  in  all  probability,  did  Jesus  pass  more  restful  and  happy 
hours  than  in  the  quiet  house  of  that  little  family  at  Bethany,  which, 
as  we  are  told  by  St.  John,  "  He  loved."  The  family,  so  far  as  we 
know,  consisted  only  of  Martha,  Mary,  and  their  brother  Lazarus. 
That  Martha  was  a  widow — that  her  husband  was,  or  had  been,  Simon 
the  Leper — that  Lazarus  is  identical  with  the  gentle  and  holy  Rabbi 
of  that  name  mentioned  in  the  Talmud — are  conjectures  that  may  or 
may  not  be  true  ;  but  we  see  from  the  Gospels  that  they  were  a  family 
in  easy  circumstances,  and  of  sufficient  dignity  and  position  to  excite 
considerable  attention  not  only  in  their  own  little  village  of  Bethany, 
but  even  in  Jerusalem.  The  lonely  little  hamlet,  lying  among  its 
peaceful  uplands,  near  Jerusalem,  and  yet  completely  hidden  from  it 
by  the  summit  of  Olivet,  and  thus 

"  Not  wholly  in  the  busy  world,  nor  quite 
Beyond  it," 

must  always  have  had  for  the  soul  of  Jesus  an  especial  charm ;  and 
the  more  so  because  of  the  friends  whose  love  and  reverence  always 
placed  at  His  disposal  their  holy  and  happy  home.  It  is  there  that  we 
find  Him  on  the  eve  of  the  Feast  of  the  Dedication,  which  marked  the 
close  of  that  public  journey  designed  for  the  full  and  final  proclama- 
tion of  His  coming  kingdom. 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  301 

It  was  natural  that  there  should  be  some  stir  in  the  little  household 
at  the  coming  of  such  a  Guest,  and  Martha,  the  busy,  eager-hearted, 
affectionate  hostess,  "on  hospitable  thoughts  intent,"  hurried  to  and 
fro  with  excited  energy  to  prepare  for  His  proper  entertainment.  Her 
sister  Mary,  too,  was  anxious  to  receive  Him  fittingly,  but  her  notions 
of  the  reverence  due  to  Him  were  of  a  different  kind.  Knowing  that 
her  sister  was  only  too  happy  to  do  all  that  could  be  done  for  His 
material  comfort,  she,  in  deep  humility,  sat  at  His  feet  and  listened  to 
His  words. 

Mary  was  not  to  blame,  for  her  sister  evidently  enjoyed  the  task 
which  she  had  chosen  of  providing  as  best  she  could  for  the  claims  of 
hospitality,  and  was  quite  able,  without  any  assistance,  to  do  every- 
thing that  was  required.  Nor  was  Martha  to  blame  for  her  active 
service ;  her  sole  fault  was  that,  in  this  outward  activity,  she  lost  the 
necessary  equilibrium  of  an  inward  claim.  As  she  toiled  and  planned 
to  serve  Him,  a  little  touch  of  jealousy  disturbed  her  peace  as  she  saw 
her  quiet  sister  sitting — "idly  "  she  may  have  thought — at  the  feet  of 
their  great  Visitor,  and  leaving  the  trouble  to  fall  on  her.  If  she  had 
taken  time  to  think,  she  could  not  but  have  acknowledged  that  there 
may  have  been  as  much  of  consideration  as  of  selfishness  in  Mary's 
withdrawal  into  the  background  in  their  domestic  administration ;  bu  t 
to  be  just  and  noble-minded  is  always  difficult,  nor  is  it  even  possible 
when  any  one  meanness,  such  as  petty  jealousy,  is  suffered  to  intrude. 
So,  in  the  first  blush  of  her  vexation,  Martha,  instead  of  gently  asking 
her  sister  to  help  her,  if  help,  indeed,  were  needed — an  appeal  which, 
if  we  judge  of  Mary  aright,  she  would  instantly  have  heard — she 
almost  impatiently,  and  not  quite  reverently,  hurries  in,  and  asks 
Jesus  if  He  really  did  not  care  to  see  her  sister  sitting  there  with 
her  hands  before  her,  while  she  was  left  single-handed  to  do  all  the 
work.  Would  He  not  tell  her  (Martha  could  not  have  fairly  added 
that  common  piece  of  ill-nature,  "It  is  of  no  use  for  me  to  tell  her  ") 
to  go  and  help  ? 

An  imperfect  soul,  seeing  what  is  good  and  great  and  true,  but  very 
often  failing  in  the  attempt  to  attain  to  it,  is  apt  to  be  very  hard  in  its 
judgments  on  the  shortcomings  of  others.  But  a  divine  and  sovereign 
soul — a  soul  that  has  more  nearly  attained  to  the  measure  of  the 
stature  of  the  perfect  man — takes  a  calmer  and  gentler,  because  a 
larger-hearted  view  of  those  little  weaknesses  and  indirectnesses  which 
it  cannot  but  daily  see.  And  so  the  answer  of  Jesus,  if  it  were  a  re- 
proof, was  at  any  rate  an  infinitely  gentle  and  tender  one,  and  one  which 


302  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

would  purify  but  would  not  pain  the  poor  faithful  heart  of  the  busy, 
loving  matron  to  whom  it  was  addressed.  "  Martha,  Martha,"  so  He  said 
— and  as  we  hear  that  most  natural  address  may  we  not  imagine  the 
half -sad,  half -playful,  but  wholly  kind  and  healing  smile  which  lightened 
His  face  ? — "  thou  art  anxious  and  bustling  about  many  things,  whereas 
but  one  thing  is  needful ;  but  Mary  chose  for  herself  the  good  part, 
which  shall  not  be  taken  away  from  her."  There  is  none  of  that 
exaltation  here  of  the  contemplative  over  the  active  life  which  Roman 
Catholic  writers  have  seen  in  the  passage,  and  on  which  they  are  so 
fond  of  dwelling.  Either  may  be  necessary,  both  must  be  combined. 
Paul,  as  has  well  been  said,  in  his  most  fervent  activity,  had  yet  the 
contemplativeness  and  inward  calm  of  Mary ;  and  John,  with  the  most 
rapt  spirit  of  contemplation,  could  yet  practise  the  activity  of  Martha. 
Jesus  did  not  mean  to  reprobate  any  amount  of  work  undertaken  in 
His  service,  but  only  the  spirit  of  fret  and  fuss — the  want  of  all 
repose  and  calm — the  ostentation  of  superfluous  hospitality — in  doing 
it ;  and  still  more  that  tendency  to  reprobate  and  interfere  with  others, 
which  is  so  often  seen  in  Christians  who  are  as  anxious  as  Martha,  but 
have  none  of  Mary's  holy  trustfulness  and  perfect  calm. 

It  is  likely  that  Bethany  was  the  home  of  Jesus  during  His  visits 
to  Jerusalem,  and  from  it  a  short  and  delightful  walk  over  the  Mount 
of  Olives  would  take  Him  to  the  Temple.  It  was  now  winter-time, 
and  the  Feast  of  the  Dedication  was  being  celebrated.  This  feast 
was  held  on  the  25th  of  Cisleu,  and,  according  to  Wieseler,  fell  this 
year  on  December  20.  It  was  founded  by  Judas  Maccabseus  in  honour 
of  the  cleansing  of  the  Temple  in  the  year  B.C.  164,  six  years  and  a 
half  after  its  fearful  profanation  by  Antiochus  Epiphanes.  Like  the 
Passover  and  the  Tabernacles,  it  lasted  eight  days,  and  was  kept  with 
great  rejoicing.  Besides  its  Greek  name  of  Encaenia,  it  had  the  name 
of  ra  ^>wra,  or  the  Lights,  and  one  feature  of  the  festivity  was  a  general 
illumination  to  celebrate  the  legendary  miracle  of  a  miraculous  multi- 
plication, for  eight  days,  of  the  holy  oil  which  had  been  found  by 
Judas  Maccabceus  in  one  single  jar  sealed  with  the  High  Priest's  seal. 
Our  Lord's  presence  at  such  a  festival  sanctions  the  right  of  each 
Church  to  ordain  its  own  rites  and  ceremonies,  and  shows  that  He 
looked  with  no  disapproval  on  the  joyous  enthusiasm  of  national 
patriotism. 

The  eastern  porch  of  the  Temple  still  retained  the  name  of  Solomon's 
Porch,  because  it  was  at  least  built  of  the  materials  which  had  formed 
part  of  the  ancient  Temple.  Here,  in  this  bright  colonnade,  decked 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHBIST.  303 

for  the  feast  with  glittering  trophies,  Jesus  was  walking  up  and  down, 
quietly,  and  apparently  without  companions,  sometimes,  perhaps, 
gazing  across  the  valley  of  the  Kidron  at  the  whited  sepulchres  of  the 
prophets,  whom  generations  of  Jews  had  slain,  and  enjoying  the  mild 
winter  sunlight,  when,  as  though  by  a  preconcertejd  movement,  the 
Pharisaic  party  and  their  leaders  suddenly  surrounded  and  began  to 
question  Him.  Perhaps  the  very  spot  where  He  was  walking,  recalling 
as  it  did  the  memories  of  their  ancient  glory — perhaps  the  memories 
of  the  glad  feast  which  they  were  celebrating,  as  the  anniversary  of  a 
splendid  deliverance  wrought  by  a  handful  of  brave  men  who  had 
overthrown  a  colossal  tyranny — inspired  their  ardent  appeal.  "  How 
long,"  they  impatiently  inquired,  "  dost  thou  hold  our  souls  in  painful 
suspense  ?  If  thou  really  art  the  Messiah,  tell  us  with  confidence. 
Tell  us  here,  in  Solomon's  Porch,  now,  while  the  sight  of  these  shields 
and  golden  crowns,  and  the  melody  of  these  citherns  and  cymbals, 
recall  the  glory  of  Judas  the  Asmonaean — wilt  thon  be  a  mightier 
Maccabfflus,  a  more  glorious  Solomon  ?  shall  these  citrons,  and  fair 
boughs,  and  palms,  which  we  carry  in  honour  of  this  day's  victory,  be 
carried  some  day  for  thee  ?  "  It  was  a  strange,  impetuous,  impatient 
appeal,  and  is  full  of  significance.  It  forms  their  own  strong  con- 
demnation, for  it  shows  distinctly  that  He  had  spoken  words  and  done 
deeds  which  would  have  justified  and  substantiated  such  a  claim  had 
He  chosen  definitely  to  assert  it.  And  if  He  had  in  so  many  words 
asserted  it — above  all,  had  He  asserted  it  in  the  sense  and  with  the 
objects  which  they  required — it  is  probable  that  they  would  have 
instantly  welcomed  Him  with  tumultuous  acclaim.  The  place  where 
they  were  speaking  recalled  the  most  gorgeous  dreams  of  their  ancient 
monarchy ;  the  occasion  was  rife  with  the  heroic  memories  of  one  of 
their  bravest  and  most  successful  warriors;  the  political  conditions 
which  surrounded  them  were  exactly  such  as  those  from  which  the 
noble  Asmonoean  had  delivered  them.  One  spark  of  that  ancient  flame 
would  have  kindled  their  inflammable  spirits  into  such  a  blaze  of 
irresistible  fanaticism  as  might  for  the  time  have  swept  away  both  the 
Romans  and  the  Herods,  but  which — since  the  hour  of  their  fall  had 
already  begun  to  strike,  and  the  cup  of  their  iniquity  was  already  full 
— would  only  have  antedated  by  many  years  the  total  destruction  which 
fell  upon  them,  first  when  they  were  slain  by  myriads  at  the  destruc- 
tion of  Jerusalem  by  Titus,  and  afterwards  when  the  false  Messiah, 
Bar-Cochebas,  and  his  followers  were  so  frightfully  exterminated  at 
the  capture  of  Bethyr. 


304  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

But  the  day  for  political  deliverances  was  past;  the  day  for  a 
higher,  deeper,  wider,  more  eternal  deliverance  had  come.  For  the 
former  they  yearned,  the  latter  they  rejected.  Passionate  to  claim  in 
Jesus  an  exclusive  temporal  Messiah,  they  repelled  Him  with  hatred  as 
the  Son  of  God,  the  Saviour  of  the  world.  That  He  was  their  Messiah 
in  a  sense  far  loftier  and  more  spiritual  than  they  had  ever  dreamed, 
His  language  had  again  and  again  implied ;  but  the  Messiah  in  the 
sense  which  they  required  He  was  not,  and  would  not  be.  And  there- 
fore He  does  not  mislead  them  by  saying,  "  I  am  your  Messiah,"  but 
He  refers  them  to  that  repeated  teaching,  which  showed  how  clearly 
such  had  been  His  claim,  and  to  the  works  which  bore  witness  to  that 
claim.  Had  they  been  sheep  of  His  flock — and  He  here  reminds  them 
of  that  great  discourse  which  He  had  delivered  at  the  Feast  of  Taber- 
nacles two  months  before — they  would  have  heard  His  voice,  and  then 
He  would  have  given  them  eternal  life,  and  they  would  have  been  safe 
in  His  keeping ;  for  no  one  would  then  have  been  able  to  pluck  them 
out  of  His  Father's  hand,  and  He  added  solemnly,  "I  and  my  Father 
are  one." 

His  meaning  was  quite  unmistakable.      In  these  words  He  was 
claiming  not  only  to  be  Messiah,  but  to  be  Divine.     Had  the  oneness 
with  the  Father  which  He  claimed  been  nothing  more  than  that  sub- 
jective union  of  faith  and  obedience  which  exists  between  all  holy 
souls  and  their  Creator — His  words  could  have  given  no  more  offence 
than  many  a  saying  of  their  own  kings  and  prophets  ;  but  "  ccce  Judaei 
intellexerunt  quod  non  intelligunf  Ariani  !  " — they  saw  at  once  that  the 
words  meant  infinitely  more.     Instantly  they  stooped  to  seize  some  of 
the  scattered  heavy  stones  which  the  unfinished  Temple  buildings  sup- 
plied to  their  fury,  and  had  His  hour  been  come,  He  could  not  have 
escaped  the  tumultuary  death  which  afterwards  befel  His  proto-martyr. 
But  His  undisturbed  majesty  disarmed  them  with  a  word:  "Many 
good  deeds  did  I  show  you  from  my  Father :  for  which  of  these  do 
ye  mean  to  stone  me  ?  "     "  Not[for  any  good  deed,"  they  replied,  "  but 
for  blasphemy,  and  because  thou,  being  a  mere  man,  art  making  thyself 
God."     The  reply  of  Jesus  is  one  of  those  broad  gleams  of  illumination 
which  He  often  sheds  on  the  interpretation  of  the  Scriptures :  "  Does 
it  not  stand  written  in  your  law,"  He  asked  them,  "  '  I  said,  Ye  are 
gods  ?  '     If  he  called  them  gods  (Elohim)  to  whom  the  Word  of  God 
came — and  such  undeniably  is  the  case  in  your  own  Scriptures — do  yc 
Bay  to  Him  whom  the  Father  sanctified  and  sent  into  the  world, '  Thou 
blasphemest,'  because  I  said,  '  I  am  the  Son  of  God  ? ' '      And  He 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  305 

appealed  to  His  life  and  to  His  works,  as  undeniable  proofs  of  His 
unity  with  the  Father.  If  His  sinlessness  and  His  miracles  were  not 
a  proof  that  He  could  not  be  the  presumptuous  blasphemer  whom  they 
wished  to  stone — what  further  proof  could  be  given  ?  They,  nursed 
in  the  strictest  monotheism,  and  accustomed  only  to  think  of  God  as 
infinitely  far  from  man,  might  have  learnt  even  from  the  Law  and 
from  the  Prophets  that  God  is  near — is  in  the  very  mouth  and  in  the 
very  heart — of  those  who  love  Him,  and  even  bestows  upon  them 
some  indwelling  brightness  of  His  own  internal  glory.  Might  not 
this  be  a  sign  to  them,  that  He  who  came  to  fulfil  the  Law  and  put  a 
loftier  Law  in  its  place — He  to  whom  all  the  prophets  had  witnessed — 
He  for  whom  John  had  prepared  the  way — He  who  spake  as  never 
man  spake — He  who  did  the  works  which  none  other  man  had  ever 
done  since  the  foundation  of  the  world — He  who  had  ratified  all  His 
words,  and  given  significance  to  all  His  deeds,  by  the  blameless  beauty 
of  an  absolutely  stainless  life — was  indeed  speaking  the  truth  when 
He  said  that  He  was  one  with  the  Father,  and  that  He  was  the  Son 
of  God? 

The  appeal  was  irresistible.  They  dared  not  stone  Him;  but,  as 
He  was  alone  and  defenceless  in  the  midst  of  them,  they  tried  to  seize 
Him.  But  they  could  not.  His  presence  overawed  them.  They  could 
only  make  a  passage  for  Him,  and  glare  their  hatred  upon  Him  as  He 
passed  from  among  them.  But  once  more,  here  was  a  clear  sign  that 
all  teaching  among  them  was  impossible.  He  could  as  little  descend 
to  their  notions  of  a  Messiah,  as  they  could  rise  to  His.  To  stay 
among  them  was  but  daily  to  imperil  His  life  in  vain.  Judrea,  there- 
fore, was  closed  to  Him,  as  Galilee  was  closed  to  Him.  There  seemed 
to  be  one  district  only  which  was  safe  for  Him  in  His  native  land,  and 
that  was  Persea,  the  district  beyond  the  Jordan.  He  retired,  therefore, 
to  the  other  Bethany — the  Bethany  beyond  Jordan,  where  John  had 
once  been  baptising — and  there  he  stayed. 

What  were  the  incidents  of  this  last  stay,  or  the  exact  length  of  its 
continuance,  we  do  not  know.  We  see,  however,  that  it  was  not 
exactly  private,  for  St.  John  tells  us  that  many  resorted  to  Him  there, 
and  believed  on  Him,  and  bore  witness  that  John — whom  they  held  to 
be  a  Prophet,  though  he  had  done  no  miracle — had  borne  emphatic 
witness  to  Jesus  in  that  very  place,  and  that  all  which  he  had 
witnessed  was  true. 


306  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

CHAPTER  XLVI. 

THE   LAST   STAY   IN   PERSIA. 

WHEREVER  the  ministry  of  Jesus  was  in  the  slightest  degree  public 
there  we  invariably  find  the  Pharisees  watching,  lying  in  wait  for 
Him,  tempting  Him,  trying  to  entrap  Him  into  some  mistaken  judg- 
ment or  ruinous  decision.  But  perhaps  even  their  malignity  never 
framed  a  question  to  which  the  answer  was  so  beset  with  difficulties  as 
when  they  came  to  tempt  him  with  the  problem,  "  Is  it  lawful  for  a 
man  to  put  away  his  wife  for  every  cause  ?  " 

The  question  was  beset  with  difficulties  on  every  side,  and  for 
many  reasons.  In  the  first  place,  the  institution  of  Moses  on  the 
subject  was  ambiguously  expressed.  Then  this  had  given  rise  to  a 
decided  opposition  of  opinion  between  the  two  most  important  and 
flourishing  of  the  rabbinic  schools.  The  difference  of  the  schools  had 
resulted  in  a  difference  in  the  customs  of  the  nation.  Lastly?  the 
theological,  scholastic,  ethical,  and  national  difficulties  were  further 
complicated  by  political  ones,  for  the  prince  in  whose  domain  the 
question  was  asked  was  deeply  interested  in  the  answer,  and  had 
already  put  to  death  the  greatest  of  the  prophets  for  his  bold 
expression  of  the  view  which  was  most  hostile  to  his  own  practices. 
Whatever  the  truckling  Rabbis  of  Galilee  might  do,  St.  John  the 
Baptist,  at  least,  had  left  no  shadow  of  a  doubt  as  to  what  was  his 
interpretation  of  the  Law  of  McS3s,  and  he  had  paid  the  penalty 
of  his  frankness  with  his  life. 

Moses  had  laid  down  the  rule  that  when  a  man  had  married  a 
wife,  and  "  she  find  no  favour  in  his  eyes  because  he  hath  found  some 
uncleanness  (marg.,  'matter  of  nakedness,'  Heb.  i?}  "!"$,  ervath  dabhar) 
in  her,  then  let  him  write  a  bill  of  divorcement,  and  give  it  in  her 
hand,  and  send  her  out  of  his  house.  And  when  she  is  departed  out 
of  his  house,  she  may  go  and  be  another  man's  wife."  Now  in  the 
interpretation  of  this  rule,  everything  depended  on  the  meaning  of  the 
expression  ervath  dabhar,  or  rather  on  the  meaning  of  the  single  word 
ervath.  It  meant,  generally,  a  stain  or  desecration,  and  Hillel,  with 
his  school,  explained  the  passage  in  the  sense  that  a  man  might 
"divorce  his  wife  for  any  disgust  which  he  felt  towards  her;  "  even — 
as  the  celebrated  R.  Akiba  ventured  to  say — if  he  saw  any  other 
woman  who  pleased  him  more;  whereas  the  school  of  Shammai 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  307 

interpreted  it  to  mean  that  divorce  could  only  take  place  in  cases  of 
scandalous  unchastity.  Hence  the  Jews  had  the  proverb  in  this 
matter,  as  in  so  many  others,  "  Hillel  loosed  what  Shammai  bound." 

Shammai  was  morally  right  and  exegetically  wrong ;  Hillel 
exegetically  right  and  morally  wrong.  Shammai  was  only  right  in 
so  far  as  he  saw  that  the  spirit  of  the  Mosaic  legislation  made  no 
divorce  justifiable  in  foro  conscientiae,  except  for  the  most  flagrant 
immorality ;  Hillel  only  right  in  so  far  as  he  saw  that  Moses  had  left 
an  opening  for  divorce  in  foro  civili  in  slighter  cases  than  these.  But 
under  such  circumstances,  to  decide  in  favour  of  either  school  would 
not  only  be  to  give  mortal  offence  to  the  other,  but  also  either  to 
exasperate  the  lax  many  or  to  disgust  the  high-minded  few.  For  in 
those  corrupt  days  the  vast  majority  acted  at  any  rate  on  the  principle 
laid  down  by  Hillel,  as  the  Jews  in  the  East  continue  to  do  to  this 
day.  Such,  in  fact,  was  the  universal  tendency  of  the  times.  In  the 
heathen,  and  especially  in  the  Roman  world,  the  strictness  of  the 
marriage  bond  had  been  so  shamefully  relaxed,  that,  whereas,  in  the 
Republic,  centuries  had  passed  before  there  had  been  one  single 
instance  of  a  frivolous  divorce,  under  the  Empire,  on  the  contrary, 
divorce  was  the  rule,  and  faithfulness  the  exception.  The  days  of  the 
Virginias,  and  Lucretias,  and  Cornelias  had  passed ;  this  was  the  age 
of  the  Julias,  the  Poppaeas,  the  Messalinas,  the  Agrippinas — the  days 
in  which,  as  Seneca  says,  women  no  longer  reckoned  their  years  by 
the  consuls,  but  by  the  number  of  their  repudiated  husbands.  The 
Jews  had  caught  up  the  shameful  precedent,  and  since  polygamy  had 
fallen  into  discredit,  they  made  a  near  approach  to  it  by  the  ease  with 
which  they  were  able  to  dismiss  one  wife  and  take  another.  Even 
Josephus,  a  Pharisee  of  the  Pharisees,  who  on  every  possible  occasion 
prominently  lays  claim  to  the  character  and  position  of  a  devout  and 
religious  man,  narrates,  without  the  shadow  of  an  apology,  that  his 
first  wife  had  abandoned  him,  that  he  had  divorced  the  second  after 
she  had  borne  him  three  children,  and  that  he  was  then  married  to  a 
third.  But  if  Jesus  decided  in  favour  of  Shammai — as  all  His 
previous  teaching  made  the  Pharisees  feel  sure  that  in  this  particular 
question  He  would  decide — then  He  would  be  pronouncing  the  public 
opinion  that  Herod  Antipas  was  a  double-dyed  adulterer,  an  adulterer 
adulterously  wedded  to  an  adulterous  wife. 

But  Jesus  was  never  guided  in  any  of  His  answers  by  principles 
of  expediency,  and  was  decidedly  indifferent  alike  to  the  anger  of 
multitudes  and  to  the  tyrant's  frown.  His  only  object  was  to  give, 

x  2 


308  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

even  to  such  inquirers  as  these,  such  answers  as  should  elevate  them 
to  a  nobler  sphere.  Their  axiom,  "  Is  it  lawful  ?  "  had  it  been  sincere, 
would  have  involved  the  answer  to  their  own  question.  Nothing  is 
lawful  to  any  man  who  doubts  its  lawfulness.  Jesus,  therefore,  instead 
of  answering  them,  directs  them  to  the  source  where  the  true  answer 
was  to  be  found.  Setting  the  primitive  order  side  by  side  with  the 
Mosaic  institution — meeting  their  "  Is  it  lawful  ?  "  with  "  Have  ye  not 
read  ?  " — He  reminds  them  that  Grod,  who  at  the  beginning  had  made 
man  male  and  female,  had  thereby  signified  His  will  that  marriage 
should  be  the  closest  and  most  indissoluble  of  all  relationships — 
transcending  and  even,  if  necessary,  superseding  all  the  rest. 

"  Why,  then,"  they  ask — eager  to  entangle  Him  in  an  opposition 
to  "  the  fiery  law  " — "  did  Moses  command  to  give  a  writing  of 
divorcement  and  put  her  away  ? "  The  form  of  their  question 
involved  one  of  those  false  turns  so  common  among  the  worshippers 
of  the  letter  ;  and  on  this  false  turn  they  based  their  inverted  pyramid 
of  yet  falser  inferences.  And  so  Jesus  at  once  corrected  them  : 
"Moses,  indeed,  for  your  hardheartedness  permitted  you  to  put  away 
your  wives  ;  but  from  the  beginning  it  was  not  so  ; "  and  then  He 
adds  as  formal  and  fearless  a  condemnation  of  Herod  Antipas — 
without  naming  him — as  could  have  been  put  in  language,  "  Whoever 
putteth  away  his  wife  and  marrieth  another,  except  for  fornication, 
committeth  adultery ;  and  he  who  marrieth  the  divorced  woman  com- 
mitteth  adultery  :  "  and  Herod's  case  was  the  worst  conceivable 
instance  of  both  forms  of  *  adultery,  for  he,  while  married  to  an 
innocent  and  undivorced  wife,  had  wedded  the  guilty  but  still 
undivorced  wife  of  Herod  Philip,  his  own  brother  and  host ;  and  he 
had  done  this,  without  the  shadow  of  any  excuse,  out  of  mere  guilty 
passion,  when  his  own  prime  of  life  and  that  of  his  paramour  was 
already  past. 

If  the  Pharisees  chose  to  make  any  use  of  this  to  bring  Jesus  into 
collision  with  Antipas,  and  draw  down  upon  Him  the  fate  of  John, 
they  might ;  and  if  they  chose  to  embitter  still  more  against  Him  the 
schools  of  Hillel  and  of  Shammai,  both  of  which  were  thus  shown  to 
be  mistaken — that  of  Hillel  from  deficiency  of  moral  insight,  that  of 
Shammai  from  lack  of  exegetical  acumen — they  might ;  but  mean- 
while He  had  once  more  thrown  a  flood  of  light  over  the  difficulties  of 
the  Mosaic  legislation,  showing  that  it  was  provisional,  not  final — 
transitory,  not  eternal.  That  which  the  Jews,  following  their  famous 
Hillel,  regarded  as  a  Divine  permission  of  which  to  be  proud,  was,  on 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  30'J 

the  contrary,  a  tolerated  evil  permitted  to  the  outward  life,  though  not 
to  the  enlightened  conscience  or  the  pure  heart — was,  in  fact,  a 
standing  witness  against  their  hard  and  imperfect  state. 

The  Pharisees,  baffled,  perplexed,  ashamed  as  usual,  found  them- 
selves again  confronted  by  a  trancendently  loftier  wisdom,  and  a 
transcenclently  diviner  insight  than  their  own,  and  retired  to  hatch 
fresh  plots  equally  malicious,  and  destined  to  be  equally  futile.  But 
nothing  can  more  fully  show  the  necessity  of  Christ's  teaching  than 
the  fact  that  even  the  disciples  were  startled  and  depressed  by  it.  In 
this  bad  age,  when  corruption  was  so  universal — when  in  Rome  mar- 
riage had  fallen  into  such  contempt  and  desuetude  that  a  law  had  to 
be  passed  which  rendered  celibates  liable  to  a  fine — they  thought  the 
pure  strictness  of  our  Lord's  precept  so  severe  that  celibacy  itself 
seemed  preferable ;  and  this  opinion  they  expressed  when  they  were 
once  more  with  Him  in  the  house.  What  a  fatal  blow  would  have 
been  given  to  the  world's  happiness  and  the  world's  morality,  had  He 
assented  to  their  rash  conclusion !  And  how  marvellous  a  proof  is  it 
of  His  Divinity,  that  whereas  every  other  pre-eminent  moral  teacher — 
even  the  very  best  and  greatest  of  all — has  uttered  or  sanctioned  more 
than  one  dangerous  and  deadly  error  which  has  been  potent  to  poison 
the  life  or  peace  of  nations — all  the  words  of  the  Lord  Jesus  were 
absolutely  holy,  and  divinely  healthy  words.  In  his  reply  He  gives 
none  of  that  entire  preference  to  celibacy  which  would  have  been 
BO  highly  valued  by  the  ascetic  and  the  monk,  and  would  have  trou- 
bled the  consciences  of  many  millions  whose  union  has  been  blessed 
by  Heaven.  He  refused  to  pronounce  upon  the  condition  of  the 
celibate  so  absolute  a  sanction.  All  that  he  said  was  that  this  saying 
of  theirs  as  to  the  undesirability  of  marriage  had  no  such  unqualified 
bearing ;  that  it  was  impossible  and  undesirable  for  all  but  the  rare 
and  exceptional  few*.  Some,  indeed,  there  were  who  were  unfitted 
for  holy  wedlock  by  the  circumstances  of  their  birth  or  constitution ; 
some,  again,  by  the  infamous,  though  then  common,  cruelties  and 
atrocities  of  the  dominant  slavery ;  and  some  who  withdrew  them- 
selves from  all  thoughts  of  marriage  for  religious  purposes,  or  in  con- 
sequence of  higher  necessities.  These  were  not  better  than  others, 
but  only  different.  It  was  the  duty  of  some  to  marry  and  serve  God 
in  the  wedded  state ;  it  might  be  the  duty  of  others  not  to  marry,  and 
so  to  serve  God  in  the  celibate  state.  There  is  not  in  these  words  of 
Christ  all  that  amount  of  difficulty  and  confusion  which  some  have  seen 
in  them.  His  precepts  find  their  best  comment  in  the  7th  and  9th 


310  THE   LIFE    OF   CHEIST. 

chapters  of  the  First  Epistle  to  the  Corinthians,  and  His  clear  meaning 
is  that,  besides  the  rare  instances  of  natural  incapacity  for  marriage, 
there  are  a  few  others — and  to  these  few  alone  the  saying  of  the  dis- 
ciples applied — who  could  accept  the  belief  that  in  peculiar  times,  or 
owing  to  special  circumstances,  or  at  the  paramount  call  of  exceptional 
duties,  wedlock  must  by  them  be  rightly  and  wisely  foregone,  because 
they  had  received  from  God  the  gift  and  grace  of  continence,  the 
power  of  a  chaste  life,  resulting  from  an  imagination  purified  and 
ennobled  to  a  particular  service. 

And  then,  like  a  touching  and  beautiful  comment  on  these  high 
words,  and  the  strongest  of  all  proofs  that  there  was  in  the  mind  of 
Christ  no  admiration  for  the  "  voluntary  service "  which  St.  Paul 
condemns,  and  the  "  works  of  supererogation  "  which  an  erring  Church 
upholds — as  a  proof  of  His  belief  that  marriage  is  honourable  in  all, 
and  the  bed  undefined — He  took  part  in  a  scene  that  has  charmed  the 
imagination  of  poet  and  painter  in  every  age.  For  as  though  to  destroy 
all  false  and  unnatural  notions  of  the  exceptional  glory  of  religious 
virginity,  He,  among  whose  earliest  acts  it  had  been  to  bless  a  marriage 
festival,  made  it  one  of  His  latest  acts  to  fondle  infants  in  His  arms. 
It  seems  to  have  been  known  in  Peraea  that  the  time  of  His  departure 
was  approaching  ;  and  conscious,  perhaps,  of  the  words  which  He  had 
just  been  uttering,  there  were  fathers  and  mothers  and  friends  who 
brought  to  Him  the  fruits  of  holy  wedlock — young  children  and  even 
babes — that  He  might  touch  them  and  pray  over  them.  Ere  He  left 
them  for  ever,  they  would  bid  Him  a  solemn  farewell ;  they  would  win, 
as  it  were,  the  legacy  of  His  special  blessing  for  the  generation  yet  to 
come.  The  disciples  thought  their  conduct  forward  and  officious.  They 
did  not  wish  their  Master  to  be  needlessly  crowded  and  troubled ;  they 
did  not  like  to  be  disturbed  in  their  high  colloquies.  They  were  indig- 
nant that  a  number  of  mere  women  and  children  should  come  obtruding 
on  more  important  persons  and  interests.  Women  were  not  honoured, 
nor  children  loved  in  antiquity  as  now  they  are ;  no  halo  of  romance 
and  tenderness  encircled  them ;  too  often  they  were  subjected  to 
shameful  cruelties  and  hard  neglect.  But  He  who  came  to  be  the 
friend  of  all  sinners,  and  the  helper  of  all  the  suffering  and  the  sick, 
carne  also  to  elevate  woman  to  her  due  honour,  centuries  before  the 
Tentonic  element  of  modern  society  waa  dreamt  of,  and  to  be  the  pro- 
tector and  friend  of  helpless  infancy  and  innocent  childhood.  Even 
tho  unconscious  little  ones  were  to  be  admitttMl  into  His  Church  by 
Hia  sacrament  of  baptism,  to  be  made  members  of  Him,  and  inhe- 


THE    LIFE   OF   CURIST.  311 

rjfcors  of  His  kingdom.  He  turned  the  rebuke  of  the  disciples  on 
themselves ;  He  was  as  much  displeased  with  them  as  they  had  been 
with  the  parents  and  children.  "  Suffer  the  little  children,"  He  said, 
in  words  which  each  of  the  Synoptists  has  preserved  for  us  in  all  their 
immortal  tenderness — "  Suffer  the  little  children  to  come  unto  me,  and 
forbid  them  not,  for  of  such  is  the  kingdom  of  heaven."  And  when 
He  had  folded  them  in  His  arms,  laid  His  hands  upon  them,  and 
blessed  them,  He  added  once  more  His  constantly  needed,  and  there- 
fore constantly  repeated,  warning,  "  Whosoever  shall  not  receive  the 
kingdom  of  heaven  as  a  little  child,  shall  not  enter  therein." 

When  this  beautiful  and  deeply  instructive  scene  was  over,  St. 
Matthew  tells  us  that  He  started  on  His  way,  probably  for  that  new 
journey  to  the  other  Bethany  of  which  we  shall  hear  in  the  next 
chapter  ;  and  on  this  road  occurred  another  incident,  which  impressed 
itself  so  deeply  on  the  minds  of  the  spectators  that  it,  too,  has  been 
recorded  by  the  Evangelists  in  a  triple  narrative. 

A  young  man  of  great  wealth  and  high  position  seems  suddenly  to 
have  been  seized  with  a  conviction  that  he  had  hitherto  neglected  an 
invaluable  opportunity,  and  that  One  who  could  alone  explain  to  him 
the  true  meaning  and  mystery  of  life  was  already  on  his  way  to  depart 
from  among  them.  Determined,  therefore,  not  to  be  too  late,  he  came 
running,  breathless,  eager — in  a  way  that  surprised  all  who  beheld  it — 
and,  prostrating  himself  before  the  feet  of  Jesus,  exclaimed,  "  Good 
Master,  what  good  thing  shall  I  do  that  I  may  inherit  life  ?  " 

If  there  was  something  attractive  in  the  mingled  impetuosity  and 
humility  of  one  so  young  and  distinguished,  yet  so  candid  and  earnest, 
there  was  in  his  question  much  that  was  objectionable.  The  notion 
that  he  could  gain  eternal  life  by  "  doing  some  good  thing,"  rested  on 
a  basis  radically  false.  If  we  may  combine  what  seems  to  be  the  true 
reading  of  St.  Matthew,  with  the  answer  recorded  in  the  other  Evan- 
gelists, our  Lord  seems  to  have  said  to  him,  "  Why  askest  thou  me 
about  the  good  ?  and  why  callest  thou  me  good  ?  One  is  the  good, 
even  God."  He  would  as  little  accept  the  title  "  Good,"  as  He  would 
accept  the  title  "  Messiah,"  when  given  in  a  false  sense.  He  would  not 
bo  regarded  as  that  mere  "  good  Rabbi,"  to  which,  in  these  days,  more 
than  ever,  men  would  reduce  Him.  So  far,  Jesus  would  show  the 
youth  that  when  He  come  to  Him  as  to  one  who  was  more  than  man, 
hia  entire  address,  as  well  as  his  entire  question,  was  a  mistake.  No 
mere  man  can  lay  any  other  foundation  than  that  which  is  laid,  and  if 
the  ruler  committed  the  error  of  simply  admiring  Jesus  as  a  Rabbi  of 


312  THE   LIFE   OF  CHKIST. 

pre-eminent  sanctity,  yet  no  Rabbi,  however  saintly,  was  accustomed 
to  receive  the  title  of  "  good,"  or  prescribe  any  amulet  for  the  preser- 
vation of  a  virtuous  life.  And  in  the  came  spirit,  He  continued  : 
"  But  if  thou  wilt  enter  into  life,  keep  the  commandments." 

The  youth  had  not  expected  a  reply  so  obvious  and  so  simple.  He 
cannot  believe  that  He  is  merely  referred  to  the  Ten  Commandments, 
and  so  he  asks,  in  surprise,  "What  sort  of  commandments  ?  "  Jesus, 
as  the  youth  wanted  to  do  something,  tells  him  merely  of  those  of  the 
Second  Table,  for,  as  has  been  well  remarked,  "  Christ  sends  the  proud 
to  the  Law,  aud  invites  the  Jiunible  to  the  Gospel"  "Master,"  replied 
the  young  man  in  surprise,  "all  these  have  I  observed  from  my  youth." 
Doubtless  in  the  mere  letter  he  may  have  done  so,  as  millions  have ; 
but  he  evidently  knew  little  of  all  that  those  commandments  had  been 
interpreted  by  the  Christ  to  mean.  And  Jesus,  seeing  his  sincerity, 
looking  on  him  loved  him,  and  gave  him  one  short  crucial  test  of  his 
real  condition.  He  was  not  content  with  the  common-place  ;  he  aspired 
after  the  heroical,  or  rather  thought  that  he  did ;  therefore  Jesus  gave 
him  an  heroic  act  to  do.  "  One  thing,"  He  said,  "  thou  lackest,"  and 
bade  him  go,  sell  all  that  he  had,  distribute  it  to  the  poor,  and  come 
and  follow  Him. 

It  was  too  much.  The  young  ruler  went  away  very  sorrowful 
grief  in  his  heart,  and  a  cloud  upon  his  brow,  for  he  had  great  posses- 
sions. He  preferred  the  comforts  of  earth  to  the  treasures  of  heaven, 
he  would  not  purchase  the  things  of  eternity  by  abandoning  those  of 
time ;  he  made,  as  Dante  calls  it,  "  the  great  refusal."  And  so  he 
vanishes  from  the  Gospel  history ;  nor  do  the  Evangelists  know  any- 
thing of  him  farther.  But  the  sad  stern  imagination  of  the  poet 
follows  him,  and  there,  among  the  myriads  of  those  who  are  blown 
about  like  autumn  leaves  on  the  confines  of  the  outer  world,  blindly 
following  the  flutter  of  a  giddy  flag,  rejected  by  Heaven,  despised  even 
by  hell,  hateful  alike  to  God  and  to  his  enemies,  he  sees 

"  1'ombra  di  colui 
Che  fcce  per  viltate  il  gran  rifiuto." 

DANTE,  In/erne,  iii.  60. 

(The  shade  of  him,  who  made  through  cowardice  the  great  refusal.) 

We  may — I  had  almost  said  we  must — hope  and  believe  a  fairer 
ending  for  one  whom  Jesus,  as  He  looked  on  him,  could  love.  But 
the  failure  of  this  youth  to  meet  the  test  saddened  Jesus,  and  looking 
round  at  His  disciples,  He  said,  "  How  hardly  shall  they  that  have 
riches  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven."  The  words  once  more 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  313 

struck  them  as  very  severe.  Could  then  no  good  man  be  rich,  no  rich 
man  be  good  ?  But  Jesus  only  answered — softening  the  sadness  and 
sternness  of  the  \vords  by  the  affectionate  title  "  children " — 
"  Children,  how  hard  it  is  to  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  God ;"  hard 
for  any  one,  but,  He  added,  with  an  earnest  look  at  His  disciples,  and 
specially  addressing  Peter,  as  the  Gospel  according  to  the  Hebrews 
tells  us,  "It  is  easier  for  a  camel  to  go  through  the  eye  of  a  needle, 
than  for  a  rich  man  to  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  God."  They  might 
well  be  amazed  beyond  measure.  Was  there  then  no  hope  for  a 
Nicodemus,  for  a  Joseph  of  Arimathaea  ?  Assuredly  there  was.  The 
teaching  of  Jesus  about  riches  was  as  little  Ebionite  as  His  teaching 
about  marriage  was  Essene.  Things  impossible  to  nature  are  possible 
to  grace ;  things  impossible  to  man  are  easy  to  God. 

Then,  with  a  touch — was  it  of  complacency,  or  was  it  of  despair  ? 
— Peter  said,  "Lo,  we  have  forsaken  all,  and  followed  thee,"  and 
cither  added  or  implied,  In  what  respect,  then,  shall  we  be  gainers  ? 
The  answer  of  Jesus  was  at  once  a  magnificent  encouragement  and  a 
solemn  warning.  The  encouragement  was  that  there  was  no  instance 
of  self-sacrifice  which  would  not,  even  in  this  world,  and  even  in  the 
midst  of  persecutions,  receive  its  hundred-fold  increase  in  the  harvest 
of  spiritual  blessings,  and  would  in  the  world  to  come  be  rewarded  by 
the  infinite  recompense  of  eternal  life  ;  the  warning  was  that  familiar 
one  which  they  had  heard  before,  that  many  of  the  first  should  be 
last,  and  the  last  first.  And  to  impress  upon  them  still  more  fully  and 
deeply  that  the  kingdom  of  heaven  is  not  a  matter  of  mercenary 
calculation  or  exact  equivalent — that  there  could  be  no  bargaining 
with  the  Heavenly  Householder — that  before  the  eye  of  God's  clearer 
and  more  penetrating  judgment  Gentiles  might  be  admitted  before 
Jews,  and  Publicans  before  Pharisees,  and  young  converts  before  aged 
Apostles — He  told  them  the  memorable  Parable  of  the  Labourers  in 
the  Vineyard.  That  parable,  amid  its  other  lessons,  involved  the 
truth  that,  while  all  who  serve  God  should  not  be  defrauded  of  their 
just  and  full  and  rich  reward,  there  could  be  in  heaven  no  murmuring, 
no  envyings,  no  jealous  comparison  of  respective  merits,  no  base 
strugglings  for  precedency,  no  miserable  disputings  as  to  who  had 
performed  the  maximum  of  service  or  who  had  received  the  minimum 
of  grace. 


314i  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

CHAPTER  XL VII. 

THE     RAISING    OF    LAZARUS. 

THESE  farewell  interviews  and  teachings  perhaps  belong  to  the  two 
days  after  Jesus — while  still  in  the  Peraean  Bethany — had  received 
from  the  other  Bethany,  where  He  had  so  often  found  a  home,  the 
solemn  message  that  "  he  whom  He  loved  was  sick."  Lazarus  was 
the  one  intimate  personal  friend  whom  Jesus  possessed  outside  the 
circle  of  His  Apostles,  and  the  urgent  message  was  evidently  an  appeal 
for  the  presence  of  Him  in  whose  presence,  so  far  as  we  know,  there 
had  never  been  a  death-bed  scene. 

But  Jesus  did  not  come.  He  contented  Himself — occupied  as  Ho 
was  in  important  works — with  sending  them  the  message  that  "  this 
sickness  was  not  to  death,  but  for  the  glory  of  God,"  and  stayed  two 
clays  longer  where  He  was.  And  at  the  end  of  those  two  days  He  said 
to  His  disciples,  "Let  us  go  into  Jndrea  again."  The  disciples 
reminded  Him  how  lately  the  Jews  had  there  sought  to  stone  Him, 
and  asked  Him  how  He  could  venture  to  go  there  again  ;  but  His 
answer  was  that  during  the  twelve  hours  of  His  day  of  work  He  could 
walk  in  safety,  for  the  light  of  His  duty,  which  was  the  will  of  His 
Heavenly  Father,  would  keep  Him  from  danger.  And  then  He  told 
them  that  Lazarus  slept,  and  that  He  was  going  to  wake  him  out  of 
sleep.  Three  of  them  at  least  must  have  remembered  how,  on  another 
memorable  occasion,  He  had  spoken  of  death  as  sleep ;  but  either  they 
were  silent,  and  others  spoke,  or  they  were  too  slow  of  heart  to 
remember  it.  As  they  understood  Him  to  speak  of  natural  sleep,  He 
had  to  tell  them  plainly  that  Lazarus  w,as  dead,  and  that  He  was  glad 
of  it  for  their  sakes,  for  that  He  would  go  to  restore  him  to  life. 
"  Let  us  also  go,"  said  the  affectionate  but  ever  despondent  Thomas, 
"  that  we  may  die  with  Him " — as  though  he  had  said,  "  It  is  all 
a  useless  and  perilous  scheme,  but  still  let  us  go." 

Starting  early  in  the  morning,  Jesus  could  easily  have  accom- 
plished the  distance — some  twenty  miles — before  sunset.  But,  on 
His  arrival,  he  stayed  outside  the  little  village.  Its  vicinity  to  Jeru- 
salem, from  which  it  is  not  two  miles  distant,  and  the  evident  wealth 
and  position  of  the  family,  had  attracted  a  large  concourse  of  distin- 
guished Jews  to  console  and  mourn  with  the  sisters;  and  it  was 
obviously  desirable  to  act  with  caution  in  venturing  among  such 


THE    LIFE    OP   CHRIST.  315 

determined  enemies.  But  while  Mary,  true  to  her  retiring  and 
contemplative  disposition,  was  sitting  in  the  house,  unconscious  of 
her  Lord's  approach,  the  more  active  Martha  had  received  intelligence 
that  He  was  near  at  hand,  and  immediately  went  forth  to  meet  Him. 
Lazarus  had  died  on  the  very  day  that  Jesus  received  the  message  of 
his  illness ;  two  days  had  elapsed  while  he  lingered  in  Persea,  a  fourth 
had  been  spent  on  the  journey.  Martha  could  not  understand  this 
sad  delay.  "  Lord,"  she  said,  in  tones  gently  reproachful,  "  if  Thou 
hadst  been  here  my  brother  had  not  died,"  yet  "  even  now  "  she  seems 
to  indulge  the  vague  hope  that  some  alleviation  may  be  vouchsafed  to 
their  bereavement.  The  few  words  which  follow  are  words  of  most 
memorable  import — a  declaration  of  Jesus  which  has  brought  comfort 
not  to  Martha  only,  but  to  millions  since,  and  which  shall  do  to  millions 
more  unto  the  world's  end — 

"  Thy  brother  shall  rise  again." 

Martha  evidently  had  not  dreamt  that  he  would  now  be  awaked 
from  the  sleep  of  death,  and  she  could  only  answer,  "  I  know  that  he 
shall  rise  again  in  the  resurrection  at  the  last  day." 

Jesus  said  unto  her,  "  I  AM  THE  RESURRECTION  AND  THE  LIFE  :  HE 

THAT  BELIEVETH  ON  ME,  THOUGH  HE  HAVE  DIED,  SHALL  LIVE  ;  AND  HE  THAT 
LIVETH  AND  BELIEVETH  ON  ME  SHALL  NEVER  DIE.  Believest  thou  this  ?  " 

It  was  not  for  a  spirit  like  Martha's  to  distinguish  the  interchang- 
ing thoughts  of  physical  and  spiritual  death  which  were  united  in 
that  deep  utterance ;  but,  without  pausing  to  fathom  it,  her  faithful 
love  supplied  the  answer,  "  Yea,  Lord,  I  believe  that  thou  art  the 
Christ,  the  Son  of  God,  which  should  come  into  the  world." 

Having  uttered  that  great  confession,  she  at  once  went  in  quest  of 
her  sister,  about  whom  Jesus  had  already  inquired,  and  whose  heart 
and  intellect,  as  Martha  seemed  instinctively  to  feel,  were  better  adapted 
to  embrace  such  lofty  truths.  She  found  Mary  in  the  house,  and  both 
the  secrecy  with  which  she  delivered  her  message,  and  the  haste  and 
iileuce  with  which  Mary  arose  to  go  and  meet  her  Lord,  show  that 
precaution  was  needed,  and  that  the  visit  of  Jesus  had  not. been  unac- 
companied with  danger.  The  Jews  who  were  comforting  her,  and 
whom  she  had  thus  suddenly  left,  rose  to  follow  her  to  the  tomb 
whither  they  thought  that  she  bad  gone  to  weep  ;  but  they  soon  saw 
the  real  object  of  her  movement.  Outside  the  village  they  found 
Jesus  surrounded  by  His  friends,  and  they  saw  Mary  hurry  up  to  Him, 
and  fling  herself  at  His  feet  with  the  same  agonising  reproach,  which 
her  sister  also  had  used,  "  Lord,  if  Thou  hadst  been  here  my  brother 


316  THE  .LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

had  not  died."  The  greater  intensity  of  her  emotion  spoke  in  her  fewer 
words  and  her  greater  self-abandonment  of  anguish,  and  she  could  add 
no  more.  It  may  be  that  her  affection  was  too  deep  to  permit  her  hope 
to  be  so  sanguine  as  that  of  her  sister ;  it  may  be  that  with  humbler 
reverence  she  left  all  to  her  Lord.  The  sight  of  all  that  love  and  misery, 
the  pitiable  spectacle  of  human  bereavement,  the  utter  futility  at  such  a 
moment  of  human  consolation,  the  shrill  commingling  of  a  hired  and 
simulated  lamentation  with  all  this  genuine  anguish,  the  unspoken  re- 
proach, "  Oh,  why  didst  Thou  not  come  at  once  and  snatch  the  victim 
from  the  enemy,  and  spare  Thy  friend  from  the  sting  of  death,  and  us  from 
the  more  bitter  sting  of  such  a  parting  ?  " — all  these  influences  touched 
the  tender  compassion  of  Jesus  with  deep  emotion.  A  strong  effort 
of  self-repression  was  needed — an  effort  which  shook  his  whole  frame 
with  a  powerful  shudder — before  He  could  find  words  to  speak,  and 
then  He  could  merely  ask,  "  Where  have  ye  laid  him  ?"  They  said, 
"  Lord,  come  and  see."  As  He  followed  them  His  eyes  were  stream- 
ing with  silent  tears.  His  tears  were  not  unnoticed,  and  while  some 
of  the  Jews  observed  with  respectful  sympathy  this  proof  of  His 
affection  for  the  dead,  others  were  asking  dubiously,  perhaps  almost 
sneeringly,  whether  He  who  had  opened  the  eyes  of  the  blind  could 
not  have  saved  His  friend  from  death  ?  They  had  not  heard  how,  in 
the  far-off  village  of  Galilee,  he  had  raised  the  dead ;  but  they  knew 
that  in  Jerusalem  He  had  opened  the  eyes  of  one  born  blind,  and  that 
seemed  to  them  a  miracle  no  less  stupendous.  But  Jesus  knew  and 
heard  their  comments,  and  once  more  the  whole  scene — its  genuine 
sorrows,  its  hired  mourners,  it  uncalmed  hatreds,  all  concentrated 
around  the  ghastly  work  of  death — came  so  powerfully  over  His 
spirit,  that,  though  He  knew  that  He  was  going  to  wake  the  dead, 
once  more  His  whole  being  was  swept  by  a  storm  of  emotion.  The 
grave,  like  most  of  the  graves  belonging  to  the  wealthier  Jews,  was  a 
recess  carved  horizontally  in  the  rock,  with  a  slab  or  mass  of  stone  to 
close  the  entrance.  Jesus  bade  them  remove  this  golal,  as  it  was 
called.  Then  Martha  interposed — partly  from  conviction  that  the 
soul  had  now  utterly  departed  from  the  vicinity  of  the  mouldering 
body,  partly  afraid  in  her  natural  delicacy  of  the  shocking  spectacle 
which  the  removal  of  that  stone  would  reveal.  For  in  that  hot 
climate  it  is  necessary  that  burial  should  follow  immediately  upon 
death,  and  as  it  was  the  evening  of  the  fourth  day  since  Lazarus  had 
died,  there  was  too  much  reason  to  fear  that  by  this  time  decom- 
position had  set  in.  Solemnly  Jesus  reminded  her  of  His  promise, 


THE    LIFE    OF    CHRIST.  317 

and  the  stone  was  moved  from  the  place  where  the  dead  was  laid.  He 
stood  at  the  entrance,  and  all  others  shrank  a  little  backward, 
with  their  eyes  still  fixed  on  that  dark  arid  silent  cave.  A 
hush  fell  upon  them  all  as  Jesus  raised  His  eyes  and  thanked 
God  for  the  coming  confirmation  of  His  prayer.  And  then,  raising 
to  its  clearest  tones  that  voice  of  awful  and  sonorous  authority, 
and  uttering,  as  was  usual  with  Him  on  such  occasions,  the 
briefest  words,  He  cried,  "  LAZARUS,  COME  FORTH  ! "  Those  words 
thrilled  once  more  through  that  region  of  impenetrable  darkness 
which  separates  us  from  the  world  to  come ;  and  scarcely  were  they 
spoken  when,  like  a  spectre,  from  the  rocky  tomb  issued  a  figure, 
swathed  indeed  in  its  white  and  ghastly  cerements — with  the  napkin 
round  the  head  which  had  upheld  the  jaw  that  four  days  previously 
had  dropped  in  death,  bound  hand  and  foot  and  face,  but  not  livid, 
not  horrible — the  figure  of  a  youth  with  the  healthy  blood  of  a  restored 
life  flowing  through  his  veins ;  of  a  life  restored — so  tradition  tells  us 
— for  thirty  more  long  years  to  life,  and  light,  and  love. 

Let  us  pause  here  to  answer  the  not  unnatural  question  as  to  the 
silence  of  the  Synoptists  respecting  this  great  miracle.  To  treat  the 
subject  fully  would  indeed  be  to  write  a  long  disquisition  on  the  struc- 
ture of  the  Gospels  ;  and  after  all  we  could  assign  no  final  explanation 
of  their  obvious  difficulties.  The  Gospels  are,  of  their  very  nature, 
confessedly  and  designedly  fragmentary,  and  it  may  be  regarded  as 
all  but  certain  that  the  first  three  were  mainly  derived  from  a  common 
oral  tradition,  or  founded  on  one  or  two  original,  and  themselves  frag- 
mentary, documents.  The  Synoptists  almost  confine  themselves  to  the 
Galilaean,  and  St.  John  to  the  Jndsean  ministry,  though  the  Synop- 
tists distinctly  allude  to  and  presuppose  the  ministry  in  Jerusalem, 
and  St.  John  the  ministry  in  Galilee.  Not  one  of  the  four  Evangelists 
proposes  for  a  moment  to  give  an  exhaustive  account,  or  even  catalogue 
of  the  parables,  discourses,  and  miracles  of  Jesus ;  nor  was  it  the 
object  of  either  of  them  to  write  a  complete  narrative  of  His  three  and 
a-half  years  of  public  life.  Each  of  them  relates  the  incidents  which 
came  most  immediately  within  his  own  scope,  and  were  best  known  to 
him  either  by  personal  witness,  by  isolated  written  documents,  or  by 
oral  tradition ;  and  each  of  them  tells  enough  to  show  that  He  was  the 
Christ,  the  Son  of  the  Living  God,  the  Saviour  of  the  world.  Now, 
since  the  raising  of  Lazarus  would  not  seem  to  them  a  greater  exercise 
of  miraculous  power  than  others  which  they  had  recorded  (John  xi.  37) 
— since,  as  has  well  been  said,  no  semeiometer  had  been  then  invented 


318  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

to  test  the  relative  greatness  of  miracles — and  since  this  miracle  fell 
within  the  Judaean  cycle — it  does  not  seem  at  all  more  inexplicable  that 
they  should  have  omitted  this,  than  that  they  should  have  omitted  the 
miracle  at  Bethesda,  or  the  opening  of  the  eyes  of  him  who  had 
been  born  blind.  But  further  than  this,  we  seem  to  trace  in  the 
Synoptists  a  special  reticence  about  the  family  at  Bethany.  The 
house  in  which  they  take  a  prominent  position  is  called  "  the  house  of 
Simon  the  leper ;"  Mary  is  called  simply  "  a  woman  "  by  St.  Matthew 
and  St.  Mark  (Matt.  xxvi.  6,  7 ;  Mark  xiv.  3) ;  and  St.  Luke  contents 
himself  with  calling  Bethany  "a  certain  village"  (Luke  x.  38), 
although  he  was  perfectly  aware  of  the  name  (Luke  xix.  29).  There 
is,  therefore,  a  distinct  argument  for  the  conjecture  that  when  the 
earliest  form  of  the  Gospel  of  St.  Matthew  appeared,  and  when  the 
memorials  were  collected  which  were  used  by  the  other  two  Synop- 
tists, there  may  have  been  special  reasons  for  not  recording  a  miracle 
which  would  have  brought  into  dangerous  prominence  a  man  who  was 
still  living,  but  of  whom  the  Jews  had  distinctly  sought  to  get  rid  as  a 
witness  of  Christ's  wonder-working  power  (John  xii.  10).  Even  if 
this  danger  had  ceased,  it  would  have  been  obviously  repulsive  to  the 
quiet  family  of  Bethany  to  have  been  made  the  focus  of  an  intense 
and  irreverent  curiosity,  and  to  be  questioned  about  those  hidden 
things  which  none  have  ever  revealed.  Something,  then,  seems  to 
have  "  sealed  the  lips  "  of  those  Evangelists — an  obstacle  which  had 
been  long  removed  when  St.  John's  Gospel  first  saw  the  light. 

"  If  they  believe  not  Moses  and  the  Prophets  " — so  ran  the  answer 
of  Abraham  to  Dives  in  the  parable — "  neither  will  they  be  converted 
though  one  (and  this,  too,  a  Lazarus !)  rose  from  the  dead."  It  was 
even  so.  There  were  many  witnesses  of  this  miracle  who  believed 
when  they  saw  it,  but  there  were  others  who  could  only  carry  an 
angry  and  alarmed  account  of  it  to  the  Sanhedrin  at  Jerusalem. 

The  Sanhedrin  met  in  a  spirit  of  hatred  and  perplexity.  They 
could  not  deny  the  miracle  ;  they  would  not  believe  on  Him  who  had 
performed  it ;  they  could  only  dread  His  growing  influence,  and  con- 
jecture that  it  would  be  used  to  make  Himself  a  king,  and  so  end  in 
Roman  intervention  and  the  annihilation  of  their  political  existence. 
And  as  they  vainly  raged  in  impotent  counsels,  Joseph  Caiaphas  rose 
to  address  them.  He  was  the  civil  High  Priest,  and  held  the  office 
eleven  years,  from  A.D.  25,  when  Valerius  Gratos  placed  him  in  it, 
till  A.D.  36,  when  Vitellius  turned  him  out.  A  large  share  indeed  of 
the  honour  which  belonged  to  his  position  had  been  .transferred  to 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  310 

Ananus,  Annas — or  to  give  him  his  true  Jewish  name,  Hanan — who 
had  simply  been  deprived  of  the  High  Priesthood  by  Roman  authority, 
and  who  (as  we  shall  see  hereafter)  was  perhaps  the  Nasi  or  Sagan, 
and  was,  at  any  rate,  regarded  as  being  the  real  High  Priest  by  the 
stricter  Jews.  Caiaphas,  however,  was  at  this  time  nominally 
and  ostensibly  High  Priest.  As  such  he  was  supposed  to  have 
that  gift  of  prophecy  which  was  still  believed  to  linger  faintly 
in  the  persons  of  the  descendants  of  Aaron,  after  the  total  disap- 
pearance of  dreams,  Urim,  omens,  prophets,  and  Bath  Kol,  which, 
in  descending  degrees,  had  been  the  ordinary  means  of  ascertaining 
the  will  of  God.  And  thus  when  Caiaphas  rose,  and  with  shameless 
avowal  of  a  policy  most  flagitiously  selfish  and  unjust,  haughtily  told 
the  Sanhedrin  that  all  their  proposals  were  mere  ignorance,  and  that 
the  only  thing  to  be  done  was  to  sacrifice  one  victim — innocent  or 
guilty  he  did  not  stop  to  inquire  or  to  define — one  victim  for  the 
whole  people — ay,  and,  St.  John  adds,  not  for  that  nation  only,  but 
for  all  God's  children  scattered  throughout  the  world — they  accepted 
unhesitatingly  that  voice  of  unconscious  prophecy.  And  by  accepting 
it  they  filled  to  the  brim  the  cup  of  their  iniquity,  and  incurred  the 
crime  which  drew  upon  their  guilty  heads  the  very  catastrophe  which 
it  was  committed  to  avert.  It  was  this  Moloch  worship  of  worse  than 
human  sacrifice  which,  as  in  the  days  of  Manasseh,  doomed  them  to  a 
second  and  a  more  terrible,  and  a  more  enduring,  destruction.  There 
were  some,  indeed,  who  were  not  to  be  found  on  that  Hill  of  Evil 
Counsel,  or  who,  if  present,  consented  not  to  the  counsel  or  will  of 
them ;  but  from  that  day  forth  the  secret  fiat  had  been  issued  that 
Jesus  must  be  put  to  death.  Henceforth  He  was  living  with  a  price 
upon  His  head. 

And  that  fiat,  however  originally  secret,  became  instantly  known. 
Jesus  was  not  ignorant  of  it ;  and  for  the  last  few  weeks  of  His  earthly 
existence,  till  the  due  time  had  brought  round  the  Passover  at  which 
He  meant  to  lay  down  His  life,  He  retired  in  secret  to  a  little  obscure 
city,  near  the  wilderness,  called  Ephraim.  There,  safe  from  all  the 
tumults  and  machinations  of  His  deadly  enemies,  He  spent  calmly 
and  happily  those  last  few  weeks  of  rest,  surrounded  only  by  His  dis- 
ciples, and  training  them,  in  that  peaceful  seclusion,  for  the  mighty 
work  of  thrusting  their  sickles  into  the  ripening  harvests  of  the  world. 
None,  or  few  beside  that  faithful  band,  knew  of  His  hiding-place ;  for 
the  Pharisees,  when  they  found  themselves  unable  to  conceal  their 
designs,  had  published  an  order  that  if  any  man  knew  where  He  was, 


320  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

be  was  to  reveal  it,  that  they  might  seize  Him,  if  necessary  even  by 
violence,  and  execute  the  decision  at  which  they  had  arrived.  But,  as 
yet,  the  bribe  had  no  effect. 

How  long  this  deep  and  much-imperilled  retirement  lasted  we  are 
not  told,  nor  can  we  lift  the  veil  of  silence  that  has  fallen  over  its 
records.  If  the  decision  at  which  the  Beth  Din  in  the  house  of 
Caiaphas  had  arrived  was  regarded  as  a  formal  sentence  of  death, 
then  it  is  not  impossible  that  these  scrupulous  legists  may  have 
suffered  forty  days  to  elapse  for  the  production  of  witnesses  in  favour 
of  the  accused.  But  it  is  very  doubtful  whether  the  destruction 
intended  for  Jesus  was  not  meant  to  be  carried  out  in  a  manner  more 
secret  and  more  summary,  bearing  the  aspect  rather  of  a  violent 
assassination  than  of  a  legal  judgment. 


CHAPTER    XLYIII. 

JERICHO  AND   BETHANY. 

FROM  the  conical  hill  of  Ephraim  Jesus  could  see  the  pilgrim  bands 
as,  at  the  approach  of  the  Passover,  they  began  to  stream  down  the 
Jordan  valley  towards  Jerusalem,  to  purify  themselves  from  every 
ceremonial  defilement  before  the  commencement  of  the  Great  Feast. 
The  time  had  come  for  Him  to  leave  His  hiding-place,  and  He 
descended  from  Ephraim  to  the  high  road  in  order  to  join  the  great 
caravan  of  Galileean  pilgrims. 

And  as  He  turned  His  back  on  the  little  town,  and  began  the 
journey  which  was  to  end  at  Jerusalem,  a  prophetic  solemnity  and 
elevation  of  soul  struggling  with  the  natural  anguish  of  the  flesh, 
which  shrank  from  that  great  sacrifice,  pervaded  His  whole  being,  and 
gave  a  new  and  strange  grandeur  to  every  gesture  and  every  look. 
It  was  the  Transfiguration  of  S  elf -sacrifice ;  and,  like  that  previous 
Transfiguration  of  Glory,  it  filled  those  who  beheld  it  with  an  amaze- 
ment and  terror  which  they  could  not  explain.  There  are  few  pictures 
in  the  Gospel  more  striking  than  this  of  Jesus  going  forth  to  His 
death,  and  walking  alone  along  the  path  into  the  deep  valley,  while 
behind  him,  in  awful  reverence,  and  mingled  anticipations  of  dread 


THE    LIFE   OF   CUBIST.  321 

And  hope — their  eyes  fixed  on  Him,  as  with  bowed  head  He  preceded 
them  in  all  the  majesty  of  sorrow — the  disciples  walked  behind  and 
dared  not  disturb  his  meditations.  But  at  last  He  paused  and 
beckoned  them  to  Him,  and  then,  once  more — for  the  third  time — 
with  fuller,  clearer,  more  startling,  more  terrible  particulars  than  ever 
before,  He  told  them  that  he  should  be  betrayed  to  the  Priests  and 
Scribes ;  by  them  condemned ;  then  handed  over  to  the  Gentiles ;  by 
the  Gentiles  mocked,  scourged,  and — He  now  for  the  first  time  revealed 
to  them,  without  any  ambiguity,  the  crowning  horror — crucified;  and 
that,  on  the  third  day,  He  should  rise  again.  But  their  minds  were 
full  of  Messianic  hopes ;  they  were  so  pre-occupied  with  the  convic- 
tion that  now  the  kingdom  of  God  was  to  come  in  all  its  splendour, 
that  the  prophecy  passed  by  them  like  the  idle  wind ;  they  could  not, 
and  would  not,  understand. 

There  can  be  no  more  striking  comment  on  their  inability  to  realise 
the  meaning  of  what  Jesus  had  said  to  them,  than  the  fact  that  very 
shortly  after,  and  during  the  same  journey,  occurred  the  ill-timed  and 
strangely  unspiritual  request  which  the  Evangelists  proceed  to  record. 
With  an  air  of  privacy  and  mystery,  Salome,  one  of  the  constant 
attendants  of  Jesus,  with  her  two  sons,  James  and  John,  who  were 
among  the  most  eminent  of  His  Apostles,  came  to  Him  with  adora- 
tions, and  begged  Him  to  promise  them  a  favour.  He  asked  what 
they  wished ;  and  then  the  mother,  speaking  for  her  fervent-hearted 
ambitious  sons,  begged  that  in  His  kingdom  they  might  sit,  the  one 
at  His  right  hand,  and  the  other  at  His  left.  Jesus  bore  gently  with 
their  selfishness  and  error.  They  had  asked  in  their  blindness  for  that 
position  which,  but  a  few  days  afterwards,  they  were  to  see  occupied 
in  shame  and  anguish  by  the  two  crucified  robbers.  Their  imagina- 
tions were  haunted  by  twelve  thrones;  His  thoughts  were  of  three 
crosses.  They  dreamt  of  earthly  crowns ;  He  told  them  of  a  cup  of 
bitterness  and  a  baptism  of  blood.  Could  they  indeed  drink  with  Him 
of  that  cup,  and  be  baptised  with  that  baptism  ?  Understanding  per- 
haps more  of  His  meaning  now,  they  yet  boldly  answered,  "  "We  can;" 
and  then  He  told  them  that  they  indeed  should  do  so,  but  that  to  sit 
on  His  right  hand  and  on  His  left  was  reserved  for  those  for  whom  it 
had  been  prepared  by  His  Heavenly  Father.  The  throne,  says  Basil, 
"is  the  price  of  toils,  not  a  grace  granted  to  ambition;  a  reward  of 
righteousness,  not  the  concession  of  a  request." 

The  ten,  when  they  heard  the  incident,  were  naturally  indignant  at 
this  secret  attempt  of  the  two  brothers  to  secure  for  themselves  a  pro- 


322  THE   LIFE   OP   CHRIST. 

eminence  of  honour ;  little  knowing  that,  so  far  as  earth  was  concerned 
— and  of  this  alone  they  dreamt — that  premium  of  honour  should  only 
be,  for  the  one  a  precedence  in  martyrdom,  for  the  other  a  prolonga- 
tion of  suffering.  This  would  be  revealed  to  them  in  due  time,  but 
even  now  Jesus  called  them  all  together,  and  taught  them,  as  He  had 
so  often  taught  them,  that  the  highest  honour  is  won  by  the  deepest 
humility.  The  shadowy  principalities  of  earth  were  characterised  by 
the  semblance  of  a  little  brief  authority  over  their  fellow-men;  it  was 
natural  for  them  to  lord  it,  and  tyrannise  it  over  their  fellows  :  but  in 
the  kingdom  of  heaven  the  lord  of  all  should  be  the  servant  of  all, 
even  as  the  highest  Lord  had  spent  His  very  life  in  the  lowest  minis- 
trations, and  was  about  to  give  it  as  a  ransom  for  many. 

As  they  advanced  towards  Jericho,  through  the  scorched  and  tree- 
less Gh6r,  the  crowd  of  attendant  pilgrims  grew  more  and  more  dense 
about  Him.  It  was  either  the  evening  of  Thursday,  Nisan  7,  or  the 
morning  of  Friday,  Nisan  8,  when  they  reached  the  environs  of  that 
famous  city — the  city  of  fragrance,  the  city  of  roses,  the  city  of  palm- 
trees,  the  "paradise  of  God."  It  is  now  a  miserable  and  degraded 
Arab  village,  but  was  then  a  prosperous  and  populous  town,  standing 
on  a  green  and  flowery  oasis,  rich  in  honey  and  leaf-honey,  and  myro- 
balanum,  and  well  watered  by  the  Fountain  of  Elisha  and  by  other 
abundant  springs.  Somewhere  in  the  vicinity  of  the  town  sat  blind 
Bartimseus,  the  son  of  Timneus,  begging  with  a  companion  of  his 
misery;  and  as  they  heard  the  noise  of  the  passing  multitude,  and 
were  told  that  it  was  Jesus  of  Nazareth  who  was  passing  by,  they 
raised  their  voices  in  the  cry,  "  Jesus,  Thou  Son  of  David,  have  mercy 
on  us."  The  multitude  resented  this  loud  clamour  as  unworthy  of  the 
majesty  of  Him  who  was  now  to  enter  Jerusalem  as  the  Messiah  of 
His  nation.  But  Jesus  heard  the  cry,  and  His  compassionate  heart 
was  touched.  He  stood  still,  and  ordered  them  to  be  called  to  Him. 
Then  the  obsequious  throng  alter  their  tone,  and  say  to  Bartiruoms, 
who  is  so  much  the  more  prominent  in  the  narrative  that  two  of  the 
Synoptists  do  not  even  mention  his  companion  at  all — "  Be  of  good 
cheer;  rise,  He  callcth  thee."  With  a  burst  of  hasty  joy,  flinging 
away  his  abba,  he  leaped  up,  and  was  led  to  Jesus.  "  What  wiliest 
thou  that  I  should  do  for  thee  ?  "  "  Babboni,"  ho  answered  (giving 
Jesus  the  most  reverential  title  that  he  knew),  "  that  I  may  recover 
my  sight."  "  Go,"  said  Jesus,  "  thy  faith  hath  saved  thee."  He 
touched  the  eyes  both  of  him  and  of  his  companion,  and  with  recovered 
eight  they  followed  among  the  rejoicing  multitudes,  glorifying  God. 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  323 

It  was  necessary  to  rest  at  Jericho  before  entering  on  the  dan- 
gerous, rocky,  robber-haunted  gorge  which  led  from  it  to  Jerusalem, 
and  formed  a  rough,  almost  continuous,  ascent  of  six  hours,  from  600 
feet  below  to  nearly  3,000  feet  above  the  level  of  the  Mediterranean. 
The  two  most  distinctive  classes  of  Jericho  were  priests  and  publicans ; 
and,  as  it  was  a  priestly  city,  it  might  naturally  have  been  expected 
that  the  king,  the  son  of  David,  the  successor  of  Moses,  wonld  be 
received  in  the  'house  of  some  descendant  of  Aaron.  But  the  place 
where  Jesus  chose  to  rest  was  determined  by  other  circumstances.  A 
colony  of  publicans  was  established  in  the  city  to  secure  the  revenues 
accruing  from  the  large  traffic  in  a  kind  of  balsam,  which  grew  more 
luxuriantly  there  than  in  any  other  place,  and  to  regulate  the  exports 
and  imports  between  the  Roman  province  and  the  dominions  of  Herod 
Antipas.  One  of  the  chiefs  of  these  publicans  was  a  man  named 
Zacchseus,  doubly  odious  to  the  people,  as  being  a  Jew  and  as  exer- 
cising his  functions  so  near  to  the  Holy  City.  His  official  rank  would 
increase  his  unpopularity,  because  the  Jews  would  regard  it  as  due  to 
exceptional  activity  in  the  service  of  their  Roman  oppressors,  and  they 
would  look  upon  his  wealth  as  a  probable  indication  of  numerous  extor- 
tions. This  man  had  a  deep  desire  to  see  with  his  own  eyes  what  kind 
of  person  Jesus  was ;  but  being  short  of  stature,  he  was  unable,  in  the 
'dense  crowd,  to  catch  a  glimpse  of  Him.  He  therefore  ran  forwardj 
as  Jesus  was  passing  through  the  town,  and  climbed  the  low  branches 
of  an  Egyptian  fig,  which  overshadowed  the  road.  Under  this  tree 
Jesus  would  pass,  and  the  publican  would  have  ample  opportunity  of 
seeing  one  who,  alone  of  His  nation,  not  only  showed  no  concentrated 
and  fanatical  hatred  for  the  class  to  which  he  belonged,  but  had 
found  among  publicans  His  most  eager  listeners,  and  had  elevated 
one  of  them  into  the  rank  of  an  Apostle.  Zaccheeus  saw  Him  as  He 
approached,  and  how  must  his  heart  have  beat  with  joy  and  gratitude, 
when  the  Great  Prophet,  the  avowed  Messiah  of  His  nation,  paused 
under  the  tree,  looked  up,  and,  calling  him  by  his  name,  bade 
him  hasten  and  come  down,  because  He  intended  to  be  a  guest  in 
his  house.  Zacchaeus  should  not  only  see  Him,  but  He  would 
come  in  and  sup  with  him,  and  make  His  abode  with  him — the 
glorious  Messiah  a  guest  of  the  execrated  publican.  With  undis- 
guised joy  Zacchaeus  eagerly  hastened  down  from  the  boughs  of 
the  "  sycamore,"  and  led  the  way  to  his  house.  But  the  murmurs  of 
the  multitude  were  long,  and  loud,  and  unanimous.  They  thought  it 
impolitic,  incongruous,  reprehensible,  that  the  King,  in  the  very  midst 

T  2 


324  THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

of  His  impassioned  followers,  should  put  up  at  tlie  house  of  a  man 
whose  very  profession  was  a  symbol  of  the  national  degradation,  and 
who  even  in  that  profession  was,  as  they  openly  implied,  disreputable. 
Bat  the  approving  smile,  the  gracious  word  of  Jesus  was  more  to 
Zacchoous  than  all  the  murmurs  and  insults  of  the  crowd.  Jesus  did 
not  despise  him  :  what  mattered  then  the  contempt  of  the  multitude  ? 
Nay,  Jesus  had  done  him  honour,  therefore  he  would  honour,  he  would 
respect  himself.  As  all  that  was  base  in  him  would  have  been  driven 
into  defiance  by  contempt  and  hatred,  so  all  that  was  noble  was 
evoked  by  a  considerate  tenderness.  He  would  strive  to  be  worthy,  at 
least  more  worthy,  of  his  glorious  guest;  he  would  at  least  do  his 
utmost  to  disgrace  Him  less.  And,  therefore,  standing  prominently 
forth  among  the  throng,  he  uttered — not  to  them,  for  they  despised 
him,  and  for  them  he  cared  not,  but  to  his  Lord — the  vow  which,  by 
one  high  act  of  magnanimity,  at  once  attested  his  penitence  and 
sealed  his  forgiveness.  "  Behold  the  half  of  my  goods,  Lord,  I  hereby 
give  to  the  poor ;  and  whatever  fraudulent  gain  I  ever  made  from  any 
one,  I  now  restore  fourfold."  This  great  sacrifice  of  that  which 
had  hitherto  been  dearest  to  him,  this  fullest  possible  restitution  of 
every  gain  he  had  ever  gotten  dishonestly,  this  public  confession  and 
public  restitution,  should  be  a  pledge  to  his  Lord  that  His  grace  had 
not  been  in  vain.  Thus  did  love  unseal  by  a  single  touch  those 
swelling  fountains  of  penitence  which  contempt  would  have  kept 
closed  for  ever !  No  incident  of  His  triumphal  procession  could  have 
given  to  our  Lord  a  deeper  and  holier  joy.  Was  it  not  His  very 
mission  to  seek  and  save  the  lost  ?  Looking  on  the  publican,  thus 
ennobled  by  that  instant  renunciation  of  the  fruits  of  sin,  which  is  the 
truest  test  of  a  genuine  repentance,  He  said,  "Now  is  salvation  come 
to  this  house,  since  he  too  is  " — in  the  true  spiritual  sense,  not  in  the 
idle,  boastful,  material  sense  alone — "a  son  of  Abraham." 

To  show  them  how  mistaken  were  the  expectations  with  which 
they  were  now  excited — how  erroneous,  for  instance,  were  the  prin- 
ciples on  which  they  had  just  been  condemning  Him  for  using  the 
hospitality  of  Zacchteus — He  proceeded  (either  at  the  meal  in  the 
publican's  house,  or  more  probably  when  they  had  again  started) 
to  tell  them  the  Parable  of  the  Pounds.  Adopting  incidents  with 
which  the  history  of  the  Herodian  family  had  made  them  familiar, 
He  told  them  of  a  nobleman  who  had  travelled  into  a  far  country 
to  receive  a  kingdom,  and  had  delivered  to  each  of  his  servants  a 
mina  to  be  profitably  employed  till  his  return  ;  the  citizens  hated  him, 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  325 

and  sent  an  embassy  after  him  to  procure  his  rejection.  But  in  spite 
of  this  his  kingdom  was  confirmed,  and  he  came  back  to  punish  his 
enemies,  and  to  reward  his  servants  in  proportion  to  their  fidelity. 
One  faithless  servant,  instead  of  using  the  sum  entrusted  to  him,  had 
hidden  it  in  a  napkin,  and  returned  it  with  an  unjust  and  insolent 
complaint  of  his  master's  severity.  This  man  was  deprived  of  his 
pound,  which  was  given  to  the  most  deserving  of  the  good  and  faith- 
ful servants ;  these  were  magnificently  rewarded,  while  the  rebellious 
citizens  were  brought  forth  and  slain.  The  parable  was  one  of  many- 
sided  application  ;  it  indicated  His  near  departure  from  the  world  ;  the 
hatred  which  should  reject  Him ;  the  duty  of  faithfulness  in  the  use  of 
all  that  He  entrusted  to  them ;  the  uncertainty  of  His  return ;  the 
certainty  that,  when  He  did  return,  there  would  be  a  solemn  account ; 
the  condemnation  of  the  slothful ;  the  splendid  reward  of  all  who 
should  serve  Him  well;  the  ntter  destruction  of  those  who  endea- 
voured to  reject  His  power.  Probably  while  He  delivered  this  parable 
the  caravan  had  paused,  and  the  pilgrims  had  crowded  round  Him 
Leaving  them  to  meditate  on  its  significance,  He  once  more  moved 
forward  alone  at  the  head  of  the  long  and  marvelling  procession. 
They  fell  reverently  back,  and  followed  Him  with  many  a  look  of  awe 
as  He  slowly  climbed  the  long,  sultry,  barren  gorge  which  led  up  to 
Jerusalem  from  Jericho. 

He  did  not  mean  to  make  the  city  of  Jerusalem  His  actual  resting- 
place,  but  preferred  as  usual  to  stay  in  the  loved  home  at  Bethany. 
Thither  He  arrived  on  the  evening  of  Friday,  Nisan  8,  A.U.C.  780 
(March  31,  A.D.  30),  six  days  before  the  Passover,  and  before  the 
sunset  had  commenced  the  Sabbath  hours.  Here  He  would  part  from 
His  train  of  pilgrims,  some  of  whom  would  go  to  enjoy  the  hospitality 
of  their  friends  in  the  city,  and  others,  as  they  do  at  the  present  day, 
would  run  up  for  themselves  rude  tents  and  booths  in  the  valley  of  the 
Kedron,  and  about  the  western  slopes  of  the  Mount  of  Olives. 

The  Sabbath  day  was  spent  in  quiet,  and  on  the  evening  they 
made  Him  a  supper.  St.  Matthew  and  St.  Mark  say,  a  little  myste- 
riously, that  this  feast  was  given  in  the  house  of  Simon  the  leper. 
St.  John  makes  no  mention  whatever  of  Simon  the  leper,  a  name 
which  does  not  occur  elsewhere  ;  and  it  is  clear  from  his  narrative  that 
the  family  of  Bethany  were  in  all  respects  the  central  figures  at  this 
entertainment.  Martha  seems  to  have  had  the  entire  supervision  of 
the  feast,  and  the  risen  Lazarus  was  almost  as  much  an  object  of 
curiosity  as  Jesus  himself.  In  short,  so  many  thronged  to  see  Lazarus 


326  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

— for  the  family  was  one  of  good  position,  and -its  members  were 
widely  known  and  beloved — that  the  notorious  and  indisputable 
miracle  which  had  been  performed  on  his  behalf  caused  many  to 
believe  on  Jesus.  This  so  exasperated  the  ruling  party  at  Jerusalem 
that,  in  their  wicked  desperation,  they  actually  held  a  consultation 
how  they  might  get  rid  of  this  living  witness  to  the  supernatural 
powers  of  the  Messiah  whom  they  rejected.  Now  since  the  raising  of 
Lazarus  was  so  intimately  connected  with  the  entire  cycle  of  events 
which  the  earlier  Evangelists  so  minutely  record,  we  are  again  driven 
to  the  conclusion  that  there  must  have  been  some  good  reason,  a 
reason  which  we  can  but  uncertainly  conjecture,  for  their  marked 
reticence  on  this  subject ;  and  we  find  another  trace  of  this  reticence  in 
their  calling  Mary  "  a  certain  woman,"  in  their  omission  of  all  allusion 
to  Martha  and  Lazarus,  and  in  their  telling  us  that  this  memorable 
banquet  was  served  in  the  house  of  "  Simon  the  leper."  Who  then 
was  this  Simon  the  leper  ?  That  he  was  no  longer  a  leper  is  of  course 
certain,  for  otherwise  he  could  not  have  been  living  in  his  own  house,  or 
mingling  in  general  society.  Had  he  then  been  cleansed  by  Jesus  ? 
and,  if  so,  was  this  one  cause  of  the  profound  belief  in  Him  which 
prevailed  in  that  little  household,  and  of  the  tender  affection  with 
which  they  always  welcomed  Him  ?  or,  again,  was  Simon  now  dead  ? 
We  cannot  answer  these  questions,  nor  are  there  sufficient  data  to 
enable  us  to  decide  whether  he  was  the  father  of  Martha  and  Mary 
and  Lazarus,  or,  as  some  have  conjectured,  whether  Martha  was  his 
widow,  and  the  inheritress  of  his  house. 

Be  this  as  it  may,  the  feast  was  chiefly  memorable,  not  for  the 
number  of  Jews  who  thronged  to  witness  it,  and  so  to  gaze  at  once  on 
the  Prophet  of  Nazareth  and  on  the  man  whom  He  had  raised  from  the 
dead,  but  from  one  memorable  incident  which  occurred  in  the  course 
of  it,  and  which  was  the  immediate  beginning  of  the  dark  and  dread- 
ful end. 

For  as  she  sat  there  in  the  presence  of  her  beloved  and  rescued 
brother,  and  her  yet  more  deeply  worshipped  Lord,  the  feelings  of  Mary 
could  no  longer  be  restrained.  She  was  not  occupied  like  her  sister  in 
the  active  ministrations  of  the  feast,  but  she  sat  and  thought  and  gazed 
until  the  fire  burned,  and  she  felt  impelled  to  some  outward  sign  of 
her  love,  her  gratitude,  her  adoration.  So  she  arose  and  fetched  an 
alabaster  vase  of  Indian  spikenard,  and  came  softly  behind  Jesus 
where  He  sat,  and  broke  the  alabaster  in  her  hands,  and  poured  the 
genuine  precious  perfume  first  over  His  head,  then  over  His  feet,  and 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  327 

then — unconscious  of  every  presence  save  His  alone — she  -wiped  those 
feet  with  the  long  tresses  of  her  hair,  while  the  atmosphere  of  the 
whole  house  was  filled  with  the  delicious  fragrance.  It  was  an  act 
of  devoted  sacrifice,  of  exquisite  self-abandonment ;  and  the  poor 
Galikeans  who  followed  Jesus,  so  little  accustomed  to  any  luxury,  so 
fully  alive  to  the  costly  nature  of  the  gift,  might  well  have  been 
amazed  that  it  should  have  all  been  lavished  on  the  rich  luxury  of 
one  brief  moment.  None  but  the  most  spiritual-hearted  there  could 
feel  that  the  delicate  odour  which  breathed  through  the  perfumed 
house  might  be  to  God  a  sweet-smelling  savour ;  that  even  this  was 
infinitely  too  little  to  satisfy  the  love  of  her  who  gave,  or  the  dignity 
of  Him  to  whom  the  gift  was  given. 

But  there  was  one  present  to  whom  on  every  ground  the  act  was 
odious  and  repulsive.  There  is  no  vice  at  once  so  absorbing,  so  un- 
reasonable, and  so  degrading  as  the  vice  of  avarice,  and  avarice  was 
the  besetting  sin  in  the  dark  soul  of  the  traitor  Judas.  The  failure  to 
struggle  with  his  own  temptations ;  the  disappointment  of  every  ex- 
pectation which  had  first  drawn  him  to  Jesus ;  the  intolerable  rebuke 
conveyed  to  his  whole  being  by  the  daily  communion  with  a  sinless 
purity ;  the  darker  shadow  which  he  could  not  but  feel  that  his  guilt 
flung  athwart  his  footsteps  because  of  the  burning  sunlight  in  which 
for  many  months  he  now  had  walked ;  the  sense  too  that  the  eye  of 
his  Master,  possibly  even  the  eyes  of  some  of  his  fellow-apostles,  had 
read  or  were  beginning  to  read  the  hidden  secrets  of  his  heart ; — all 
these  things  had  gradually  deepened  from  an  incipient  alienation  into 
an  insatiable  repugnancy  and  hate.  And  the  sight  of  Mary's  lavish 
sacrifice,  the  consciousness  that  it  was  now  too  late  to  save  that  large 
sum  for  the  bag — the  mere  possession  of  which,  apart  from  the  sums 
which  he  could  pilfer  out  of  it,  gratified  his  greed  for  gold — filled  him 
with  disgust  and  madness.  He  had  a  devil.  He  felt  as  if  he  had 
been  personally  cheated ;  as  if  the  money  were  by  right  his,  and  he 
had  been,  in  a  senseless  manner,  defrauded  of  it.  "  To  what  purpose 
is  this  waste  ?  "  he  indignantly  said ;  and,  alas !  how  often  have  his 
words  been  echoed,  for  wherever  there  is  an  act  of  splendid  self-for- 
getfulness  there  is  always  a  Judas  to  sneer  and  murmur  at  it.  "  This 
ointment  might  have  been  sold  for  three  hundred  pence  and  given  to 
the  poor !"  Three  Itwidred  pence — ten  pounds  or  more!  There  was 
perfect  frenzy  in  the  thought  of  such  utter  perdition  of  good  money ; 
why,  for  barely  a  third  of  such  a  sum,  this  sou  of  perdition  was  ready 
to  sell  his  Lord.  Mary  thought  it  not.  good  enough  to  anele  Christ's 


328  THE    LIFE    OP  CHRIST. 

sacred  feet:  Judas  thought  a  third  part  of  it  sufficient  reward  for 
selling  His  very  life. 

That  little  touch  about  its  "  being  given  to  the  poor "  is  a  very 
instructive  one.  It  was  probably  the  veil  used  by  Judas  to  half  con- 
ceal even  from  himself  the  grossness  of  his  own  motives — the  fact 
that  he  was  a  petty  thief,  and  really  wished  the  charge  of  this  money 
because  it  would  have  enabled  him  to  add  to  his  own  private  store. 
People  rarely  sin  under  the  full  glare  of  self-consciousness;  they 
usually  blind  themselves  with  false  pretexts  and  specious  motives ; 
and  though  Judas  could  not  conceal  his  baseness  from  the  clearer  eye 
of  John,  he  probably  concealed  it  from  himself  under  the  notion  that 
he  really  was  protesting  against  an  act  of  romantic  wastefulness,  and 
pleading  the  cause  of  disinterested  charity. 

But  Jesus  would  not  permit  the  contagion  of  this  worldly  indig- 
nation— which  had  already  infected  some  of  the  simple  disciples — to 
spread  any  farther ;  nor  would  He  allow  Mary,  already  the  centre  of 
an  unfavourable  observation  which  pained  and  troubled  her,  to  suffer 
any  more  from  the  consequences  of  her  noble  act.  "  Why  trouble  ye 
the  woman?"  He  said.  "Let  her  alone;  she  wrought  a  good  work 
upon  Me  ;  for  ye  have  the  poor  always  with  yon,  but  Me  ye  have  not 
always ;  for  in  casting  this  ointment  on  My  body,  she  did  it  for  My 
burying."  And  He  added  the  prophecy — a  prophecy  which  to  this 
day  is  memorably  fulfilled — that  wherever  the  Gospel  should  be 
preached  that  deed  of  hers  should  be  recorded  and  honoured. 

"  For  My  burying " — clearly,  therefore,  His  condemnation  and 
burial  were  near  at  hand.  This  was  another  death-blow  to  all  false 
Messianic  hopes.  No  earthly  wealth,  no  regal  elevation  could  be 
looked  for  by  the  followers  of  One  who  was  so  soon  to  die.  It  may 
have  been  another  impulse  of  disappointment  to  the  thievish  traitor 
who  had  thus  publicly  been  not  only  thwarted,  but  also  silenced,  and 
implicitly  rebuked.  The  loss  of  the  money,  which  might  by  imagina- 
tion have  been  under  his  own  control,  burnt  in  him  with  "a  secret, 
dark,  melancholic  fire."  He  would  not  lose  everything.  In  his  hatred, 
and  madness,  and  despair,  he  slunk  away  from  Bethany  that  night, 
and  made  his  way  to  Jerusalem,  and  got  introduced  into  the  council - 
room  of  the  chief  priests  in  the  house  of  Caiaphas,  and  had  that  first 
fatal  interview  in  which  he  bargained  with  them  to  betray  his  Lord. 
"What  are  you  willing  to  give  me,  and  I  will  betray  Him  to  you  r"' 
What  greedy  chafferings  took  place  we  are  not  told,  nor  whether  the 
counter-avarices  of  these  united  hatreds  had  a  struggle  before  they 


THE   LIFE   OF   CUEIST.  329 

decided  on  the  paltry  blood-money.  If  so,  the  astute  Jewish  priests 
beat  down  the  poor  ignorant  Jewish  Apostle.  For  all  that  they 
offered  and  all  they  paid  was  thirty  pieces  of  silver — about  £3  16s. — 
the  ransom-money  of  the  meanest  slave.  For  this  price  he  was  to  sell 
his  Master,  and  in  selling  his  Master  to  sell  his  own  life,  and  to  gain 
in  return  the  execration  of  the  world  for  all  generations  yet  to  come. 
And  so,  for  the  last  week  of  his  own  and  his  Master's  life,  Judas 
moved  about  with  the  purpose  of  murder  in  his  dark  and  desperate 
heart.  But  as  yet  no  day  had  been  fixed,  no  plan  decided  on — only 
the  betrayal  paid  for;  and  there  seems  to  have  been  a  general  con- 
viction that  it  would  not  do  to  make  the  attempt  during  the  actual 
feast,  lest  there  should  be  an  uproar  among  the  multitude  who 
accepted  Him,  and  especially  among  the  dense  throngs  of  pilgrims 
from  His  native  Galilee.  They  believed  that  many  opportunities 
would  occur,  either  at  Jerusalem  or  elsewhere,  when  the  Great  Pass- 
over was  finished,  and  the  Holy  City  had  relapsed  into  its  ordinary 
calm. 

And  the  events  of  the  following  day  would  be  likely  to  give  the 
most  emphatic  confirmation  to  the  worldly  wisdom  of  their  wicked 
decision. 


CHAPTER    XLIX. 

PALM   SUNDAY. 

THERE  seems  to  have  been  a  general  impression  for  some  time  before- 
hand that,  in  spite  of  all  which  had  recently  happened,  Jesus  would 
still  be  present  at  the  Paschal  Feast.  The  probability  of  this  had 
incessantly  been  debated  among  the  people,  and  the  expected  arrival 
of  the  Prophet  of  Galilee  was  looked  forward  to  with  intense  curiosity 
and  interest. 

Consequently,  when  it  became  known  early  on  Sunday  morning 
that  during  the  day  He  would  certainly  enter  the  Holy  City,  the 
excitement  was  very  great.  The  news  would  be  spread  by  some  of 
the  numerous  Jews  who  had  visited  Bethany  on  the  previous  evening, 
after  the  sunset  had  closed  the  Sabbath,  and  thus  enabled  them  to 


330  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

exceed  the  limits  of  the  Sabbath  day's  journey.  Thus  it  was  that 
a  very  great  multitude  was  prepared  to  receive  and  welcome  the 
Deliverer  who  had  raised  the  dead. 

He  started  oil  foot.  Three  roads  led  from  Bethany  over  the  Mount 
of  Olives  to  Jerusalem.  One  of  these  passes  between  its  northern  and 
central  summits ;  the  other  ascends  the  highest  point  of  the  mountain, 
and  slopes  down  through  the  modern  village  of  Et  Tur;  the  third, 
which  is,  and  always  must  have  been,  the  main  road,  sweeps  round 
the  southern  shoulder  of  the  central  mass,  between  it  and  the  "  Hill  of 
Evil  Counsel."  The  others  are  rather  mountain  paths  than  roads,  and 
as  Jesus  was  attended  by  so  many  disciples,  it  is  clear  that  He  took 
the  third  and  easiest  route. 

Passing  from  under  the  palm-trees  of  Bethany,  they  approached 
the  fig-gardens  of  Bethphage,  the  "House  of  Figs,"  a  small  suburb  or 
hamlet  of  undiscovered  site,  which  lay  probably  a  little  to  the  south 
of  Bethany,  and  in  sight  of  it.  To  this  village,  or  some  other  hamlet 
which  lay  near  it,  Jesus  dispatched  two  of  His  disciples.  The  minute 
description  of  the  spot  given  by  St.  Mark  makes  us  suppose  that 
Peter  was  one  of  them,  and  if  so  he  was  probably  accompanied 
by  John.  Jesus  told  him  that  when  they  got  to  the  village  they 
should  find  an  ass  tied,  and  a  colt  with  her ;  these  they  were  to  loose 
and  bring  to  Hira,  and  if  any  objection  arose  on  the  part  of  the 
owner,  it  would  at  once  be  silenced  by  telling  him  that  "  the  Lord  had 
need  of  them."  Everything  happened  as  He  had  said.  In  the  passage 
round  the  house — i.e.,  tied  up  at  the  back  of  the  house — 'they  found 
the  ass  and  the  foal,  which  was  adapted  for  its  sacred  purpose  because 
it  had  never  yet  been  used.  The  owners,  on  hearing  their  object,  at 
once  permitted  them  to  take  the  animals,  and  they  led  them  to  Jesus, 
putting  their  garments  over  them  to  do  Him  regal  honour.  Then 
they  lifted  Him  upon  the  colt,  and  the  triumphal  procession  set  forth. 
It  was  no  seditious  movement  to  stir  up  political  enthusiasm,  no 
"  insulting  vanity  "  to  commemorate  ambitious  triumph.  Nay,  it  was 
a  mere  outburst  of  provincial  joy,  the  simple  exultation  of  poor  Gali- 
leeans  and  despised  disciples.  He  rides,  not  upon  a  war-horse,  but  on 
an  animal  which  was  the  symbol  of  peace.  The  haughty  Gentiles,  had 
they  witnessed  the  humble  procession,  would  have  utterly  derided  it, 
as  indeed  they  did  deride  the  record  of  it ;  but  the  Apostles  recalled  in 
after  days  that  it  fulfilled  the  prophecy  of  Zechariah :  "  Rejoice 
greatly,  0  daughter  of  Sion ;  shout,  0  daughter  of  Jerusalem  ;  be- 
hold, thy  King  cometh  unto  thec ;  He  is  meek,  and  having  salvation ; 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  331 

lowly,  and  riding  upon  an  ass,  and  upon  a  colt  the  foal  of  an  ass." 
Yes,  it  was  a  procession  of  very  lowly  pomp,  and  yet  beside  it  how  do 
the  grandest  triumphs  of  aggressive  war  and  unjust  conquest  sink  into 
utter  insignificance  and  disgrace  ! 

Jesus  mounted  the  unused  foal,  while  probably  some  of  His  disciples 
led  it  by  the  bridle.  And  no  sooner  had  He  started  than  the  multitude 
spread  out  their  upper  garments  to  tapestry  His  path,  and  kept  tea'ring 
or  cutting  down  the  boughs  of  olive,  and  fig,  and  walnut,  to  scatter 
them  before  Him.  Then,  in  a  burst  of  enthusiasm,  the  disciples  broke 
into  the  shout,  "  Hosanna  to  the  Son  of  David  !  Blessed  is  the  King 
of  Israel  that  cometh  in  the  name  of  the  Lord !  Hosanna  in  the 
highest !  "  and  the  multitude  caught  up  the  joyous  strain,  and  told 
each  other  how  He  had  raised  Lazarus  from  the  dead. 

The  road  slopes  by  a  gradual  ascent  up  the  Mount  of  Olives, 
through  green  fields  and  under  shady  trees,  till  it  suddenly  sweeps 
round  to  the  northward.  It  is  at  this  angle  of  the  road  that  Jerusalem, 
which  hitherto  has  been  hidden  by  the  shoulder  of  the  hill,  bursts  full 
upon  the  view.  There,  through  the  clear  atmosphere,  rising  out  of 
the  deep  umbrageous  valleys  which  surrounded  it,  the  city  of  ten 
thousand  memories  stood  clear  before  Him,  and  the  morning  sunlight, 
as  it  blazed  on  the  marble  pinnacles  and  gilded  roofs  of  the  Temple 
buildings,  was  reflected  in  a  very  fiery  splendour  which  forced  the 
spectator  to  avert  his  glance.  Such  a  glimpse  of  such  a  city  is  at  all 
times  affecting,  and  many  a  Jewish  and  Gentile  traveller  has  reined 
his  horse  at  this  spot,  and  gazed  upon  the  scene  in  emotion  too  deep 
for  speech.  But  the  Jerusalem  of  that  day,  with  "  its  imperial  mantle 
of  proud  towers,"  was  regarded  as  one  of  the  wonders  of  the  world, 
and  was  a  spectacle  incomparably  more  magnificent  than  the  decayed 
and  crumbling  city  of  to-day.  And  who  can  interpret,  who  can  enter 
into  the  mighty  rush  of  divine  compassion  which,  at  that  spectacle, 
shook  the  Saviour's  soul  ?  As  He  gazed  on  that  "  mass  of  gold  and 
snow,"  was  there  no  pride,  no  exultation  in  the  heart  of  its  true  King  ? 
Far  from  it !  He  had  dropped  silent  tears  at  the  grave  of  Lazarus ; 
here  He  wept  aloud.  All  the  shame  of  His  mockery,  all  the  anguish 
of  His  torture,  was  powerless,  five  days  afterwards,  to  extort  from 
Him  a  single  groan,  or  to  wet  His  eyelids  with  one  trickling  tear ; 
but  here,  all  the  pity  that  was  within  Him  overmastered  His  human 
spirit,  and  He  not  only  wept,  but  broke  into  a  passion  of  lamentation, 
in  which  the  choked  voice  seemed  to  struggle  for  its  utterance.  A 
strange  Messianic  triumph  !  a  strange  interruption  of  the  festal  cries  ! 


332  THE  LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

The  Deliverer  weeps  over  the  city  which  it  is  now  too  late  to  save ; 
the  King  prophesies  the  titter  ruin  of  the  nation  which  He  came  to 
rule  !  "  If  thou  hadst  known,"  He  cried — while  the  wondering  multi- 
tudes looked  on,  and  knew  not  what  to  think  or  say — "  If  thou  hadst 
known,  even  thou,  at  least  in  thy  day,  the  things  that  belong  unto  thy 
peace  ! " — and  there  sorrow  interrupted  the  sentence,  and,  when  He 
found  voice  to  continue,  He  could  only  add,  "  but  now  they  are  hid 
from  thine  eyes.  For  the  days  shall  come  upon  thee  that  thine 
enemies  shall  cast  a  trench  about  thee,  and  compass  thee  round,  and 
keep  thee  in  on  every  side,  and  shall  lay  thee  even  with  the  ground, 
and  thy  children  within  thee ;  and  they  shall  not  leave  in  thee  one 
stone  upon  another,  because  thou  knewest  not  the  time  of  thy 
visitation."  It  was  the  last  invitation  from  "  the  Glory  of  God  on  the 
Mount  of  Olives,"  before  that  Shechinah  vanished  from  their  eyes  for 
ever. 

Sternly,  literally,  terribly,  within  fifty  years,  was  that  prophecy 
fulfilled.  Pour  years  before  the  war  began,  while  as  yet  the  city  was 
in  the  greatest  peace  and  prosperity,  a  melancholy[maniac  traversed  its 
streets  with  the  repeated  cry,  "  A  voice  from  the  east,  a  voice  from  the 
west,  a  voice  from  the  four  winds,  a  voice  against  Jerusalem  and  the 
holy  house,  and  a  voice  against  the  bridegrooms  and  the  brides,  and  u 
voice  against  this  whole  people ;  "  nor  could  any  scourgings  or  tortures 
wring  from  him  any  other  words  except  "  Woe  !  woe  !  to  Jerusalem  ; 
woe  to  the  city ;  woe  to  the  people ;  woe  to  the  holy  house !  "  until 
seven  years  afterwards,  during  the  siege,  he  was  killed  by  a  stone  from 
a  catapult.  His  voice  was  but  the  renewed  echo  of  the  voice  of 
prophecy. 

Titus  had  not  originally  wished  to  encompass  the  city,  but  he  was 
forced,  by  the  despair  and  obstinacy  of  the  Jews,  to  surround  it,  first 
with  a  palisaded  mound,  and  then,  when  this  vallum  and  agger  were 
destroyed,  with  a  wall  of  masonry.  He  did  not  wish  to  sacrifice  the 
Temple — nay,  he  made  every  possible  effort  to  save  it — but  ho  was 
forced  to  leave  it  in  ashes.  He  did  not  intend  to  be  cruel  to  the  inha- 
bitants, but  the  deadly  fanaticism  of  their  opposition  so  extinguished 
all  desire  to  spare  them,  that  he  undertook  the  task  of  well-nigh  exter- 
minating the  race — of  crucifying  them  by  hundreds,  of  exposing  them 
in  the  amphitheatre  by  thousands,  of  selling  them  into  slavery  by 
myriads.  Josephns  tells  us  that,  even  immediately  after  the  siege  of 
Titus,  no  one,  in  the  desert  waste  around  him,  would  have  recognised 
the  beauty  of  Judaea;  and  that  if  any  Jew  had  come  upon  the  city  of  a 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  333 

sadden,  however  well  he  had  known  it  before,  he  would  have  asked 
"  what  place  it  was  ?  "  And  he  who,  in  modern  Jerusalem,  would  look 
for  relics  of  the  ten-times-captured  city  of  the  days  of  Christ,  must  look 
for  them  twenty  feet  beneath  the  soil,  and  will  scarcely  find  them.  In 
one  spot  alone  remain  a  few  massive  substructions,  as  though  to  show 
how  vast  is  the  ruin  they  represent ;  and  here,  on  every  Friday, 
assemble  a  few  poverty-stricken  Jews,  to  stand  each  in  the  shroud 
in  which  he  will  be  buried,  and  wail  over  the  shattered  glories  of 
their  fallen  and  desecrated  home. 

There  had  been  a  pause  in  the  procession  while  Jesus  shed  His 
bitter  tears  and  uttered  His  prophetic  lamentation.  But  now  the 
people  in  the  valley  of  Kedron,  and  about  the  walls  of  Jerusalem, 
and  the  pilgrims  whose  booths  and  tents  stood  so  thickly  on  the  green 
slopes  below,  had  caught  sight  of  the  approaching  company,  and  heard 
the  echo  of  the  glad  shouts,  and  knew  what  the  commotion  meant. 
At  that  time  the  palms  were  numerous  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Jeru- 
salem, though  now  but  a  few  remain :  and  tearing  down  their  green 
and  graceful  branches,  the  people  streamed  up  the  road  to  meet  the 
approaching  Prophet.  And  when  the  two  streams  of  people  met — 
those  who  had  accompanied  Him  from  Bethany,  and  those  who  had 
come  to  meet  Him  from  Jerusalem — they  left  Him  riding  in  the 
midst,  and  some  preceding,  some  following  Him,  advanced,  shouting 
"  Hosannas  "  and  waving  branches,  to  the  gate  of  Jerusalem. 

Mingled  among  the  crowd  were  some  of  the  Pharisees,  and  the  joy 
of  the  multitude  was  to  them  gall  and  wormwood.  What  meant  these 
Messianic  cries  and  kingly  titles  ?  Were  they  not  dangerous  and  un- 
seemly ?  Why  did  He  allow  them  ?  "  Master,  rebuke  Thy  disciples." 
But  He  would  not  do  so.  "  If  these  should  hold  their  peace,"  He  said, 
"  the  stones  would  immediately  cry  out."  The  words  may  have  recalled 
to  them,  the  threats  which  occur,  amid  denunciations  against  covetous- 
ness  and  cruelty,  and  the  utter  destruction  by  which  they  should  bo 
avenged,  in  the  prophet  Habakkuk — "  For  the  stone  shall  cry  out  of 
the  wall,  and  the  beam  out  of  the  timber  shall  answer  it."  The 
Pharisees  felt  that  they  were  powerless  to  stay  the  flood  of  enthusiasm. 

And  when  they  reached  the  walls  the  whole  city  was  stirred  with 
powerful  excitement  and  alarm.  "  Who  is  this  ?  "  they  asked,  as  they 
leaned  out  of  the  lattices  and  from  the  roofs,  and  stood  aside  in  the 
bazaars  and  streets  to  let  them  pass ;  and  the  multitude  answered, 
with  something  of  pride  in  their  great  countryman — but  already,  as  it 
were,  with  a  shadow  of  distrust  falling  over  their  high  Messianic 


334  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

hopes,  as  they  came  in  contact  with  the  contempt  and  hostility  of  the 
capital — "  This  is  Jesus,  the  Prophet  of  Nazareth." 

The  actual  procession  would  not  proceed  farther  than  the  foot  of 
Mount  Moriah  (the  Har  lia-lteit,  Isa.  ii.  2),  beyond  which  they  might 
not  advance  in  travelling  array,  or  with  dusty  feet.  Before  they  had 
reached  the  Shushan  gate  of  the  Temple  they  dispersed,  and  Jesus 
entered.  The  Lord  whom  they  sought  had  come  suddenly  to  His 
Temple — even  the  messenger  of  the  covenant ;  but  they  neither  recog- 
nised Him,  nor  delighted  in  Him,  though  His  first  act  was  to  purify 
and  purge  it,  that  they  might  offer  to  the  Lord  an  offering  in  righteous- 
ness. As  He  looked  round  on  all  things  His  heart  was  again  moved 
within  Him  to  strong  indignation.  Three  years  before,  at  His  first 
Passover,  He  had  cleansed  the  Temple ;  but,  alas !  in  vain.  Already 
greed  had  won  the  battle  against  reverence;  already  the  tessellated 
floors  and  pillared  colonnades  of  the  Court  of  the  Gentiles  had  been 
again  usurped  by  droves  of  oxen  and  sheep,  and  dove-sellers,  and 
usurers,  and  its  whole  precincts  were  dirty  with  driven  cattle,  and 
echoed  to  the  hum  of  bargaining  voices  and  the  clink  of  gold.  In 
that  desecrated  place  He  would  not  teach.  Once  more,  in  mingled 
sorrow  and  anger,  He  drove  them  forth,  while  none  dared  to  resist  His 
burning  zeal ;  nor  would  He  even  suffer  the  peaceful  enclosure  to  be 
disturbed  by  people  passing  to  and  fro  with  vessels,  and  so  turning  it 
into  a  thoroughfare.  The  dense  crowd  of  Jews — numbering,  it  is 
said,  three  millions — who  crowded  to  the  Holy  City  in  the  week  of 
the  feast,  no  doubt  made  the  Court  of  the  Gentiles  a  worse  and  busier 
scene  on  that  day  than  at  any  other  time,  and  the  more  so  because  on 
that  day,  according  to  the  law,  the  Paschal  lamb — which  the  visitors 
would  be  obliged  to  purchase — was  chosen  and  set  apart.  But  no 
considerations  of  their  business  and  convenience  could  make  it  toler- 
able that  they  should  turn  His  Father's  house,  which  was  a  house  of 
prayer  for  all  nations,  into  a  place  most  like  one  of  those  foul  caves 
which  He  had  seen  so  often  in  the  Waddy  Hammam,  where  brigands 
wrangled  over  their  ill-gotten  spoils. 

Not  till  He  had  reduced  the  Temple  to  decency  and  silence  could 
He  begin  His  customary  ministrations.  Doubtless  the  task  was  easier, 
because  it  had  already  been  once  performed.  But  when  the  miserable 
hubbub  was  over,  then  the  Temple  resumed  what  should  have  been 
its  normal  aspect.  Sufferers  came  to  Him,  and  He  healed  them. 
Listeners  in  hundreds  thronged  round  him,  were  astonished  at  His 
doctrine,  hung  upon  His  lips.  The  very  children  of  the  Temple,  in 


THE    LIFE  "OF   CHRIST.  3«35 

their  innocent  delight,  continued  the  glad  Hosannas  which  had  wel- 
comed him.  The  Chief  Priests,  and  Scribes,  and  Pharisees,  and  lead- 
ing people  saw,  and  despised,  and  wondered,  and  perished.  They 
could  but  gnash  their  teeth  in  their  impotence,  daring  to  do  nothing, 
saying  to  each  other  that  they  could  do  nothing,  for  the  whole  world 
had  gone  after  Him,  yet  hoping  still  that  their  hour  would  come,  and 
the  power  of  darkness.  If  they  ventured  to  say  one  word  to  Him, 
they  had  to  retire  abashed  and  frustrated  by  His  calm  reply.  They 
angrily  called  his  attention  to  the  cry  of  the  boys  in  the  Temple 
courts,  and  said,  "  Hearest  thou  what  these  say  ?  "  Perhaps  they  were 
boys  employed  in  the  musical  services  of  the  Temple,  and  if  so  the 
priestly  party  would  be  still  more  enraged.  But  Jesus  calmly  pro- 
tected the  children  from  their  unconcealed  hatred.  "  Yea,"  he 
answered,  "  have  ye  never  read,  Out  of  the  mouths  of  babes  and 
sucklings  Thou  hast  perfected  praise  ?  " 

So  in  high  discourse,  amid  the  vain  attempts  of  His  enemies  to 
annoy  and  hinder  Him,  the  hours  of  that  memorable  day  passed  by. 
And  it  was  marked  by  one  more  deeply  interesting  incident.  Struck 
by  all  they  had  seen  and  heard,  some  Greeks — probably  Jewish  pro- 
selytes attracted  to  Jerusalem  by  the  feast — came  to  Philip,  and  asked 
him  to  procure  for  them  a  private  interview  with  Jesus.  Chaldaeans 
from  the  East  had  sought  His  cradle;  these  Greeks  from  the  "West 
came  to  His  cross.  Who  they  were,  and  why  they  sought  Him,  we 
know  not.  An  interesting  tradition,  but  one  on  which  unfortunately 
we  can  lay  no  stress,  says  that  they  were  emissaries  from  Abgarus  V., 
King  of  Edessa,  who,  having  been  made  aware  of  the  miracles  of 
Jesus,  and  of  the  dangers  to  which  He  was  now  exposed,  sent  these 
emissaries  to  offer  him  an  asylum  in  his  dominions.  The  legend  adds 
that,  though  Jesus  declined  the  offer,  He  rewarded  the  faith  of  Abgarus 
by  writing  him  a  letter,  and  healing  him  of  a  sickness. 

St.  John  mentions  nothing  of  these  circumstances ;  he  does  not 
even  tell  us  why  these  Greeks  came  to  Philip  in  particular.  As  Beth- 
saida  was  the  native  town  of  this  Apostle,  and  as  many  Jews  at  this 
period  had  adopted  Gentile  appellations,  especially  those  which  were 
current  in  the  family  of  Herod,  we  cannot  attach  much  importance  to 
the  Greek  form  of  his  name.  It  is  an  interesting  indication  of  the 
personal  awe  which  the  Apostles  felt  for  their  Master,  that  Philip  did 
not  at  once  venture  to  grant  their  request.  He  went  and  consulted  his 
fellow-townsman  Andrew,  and  the  two  Apostles  then  made  known  tho 
wish  of  the  Greeks  to  Jesus.  Whether  they  actually  introduced  the 


336  THE   Lll'E    OF   CHRIST. 

inquirers  into  His  presence  we  cannot  tell,  but  at  any  rate  He  saw  in 
the  incident  a  fresh  sign  that  the  hour  was  come  when  His  name 
should  be  glorified.     His  answer  was  to  the  effect  that  as  a  grain  of 
wheat  must  die  before  it  can  bring  forth  fruit,  so  the  road  to  His 
glory  lay  through  humiliation,  and  they  who  would  follow  Him  must 
be  prepared  at  all  times  to  follow  Him  even  to  death.      As  he  con- 
templated that  approaching  death,  the  human  horror  of  it  struggled 
with  the  ardour  of  His  obedience ;    and  conscious  that  to  face  that 
dread  hour  was  to  conquer  it,  He  cried,  "  Father,  glorify  Thy  name !  " 
Then  for  the  third  time  in  His  life  came  a  voice  from  heaven,  which 
said,  "  I  have  both  glorified  it,  and  will  glorify  it  again."     St.  John 
frankly  tells   us  that   that  Voice  did  not  sound  alike  to  all.      The 
common  multitude  took  it  but  for  a  passing  peal  of  thunder ;  others 
said,  "  An  angel  spake  to  Him ;  "  the  Voice  was  articulate  only  to  the 
few.     But  Jesus  told  them  that  the  Voice  was  for  their  sakes,  not  for 
His  ;  for  the  judgment  of  the  world,  its  conviction  of  sin  by  the  Holy 
Spirit,  was  now  at  hand,  and  the  Prince  of  this  world  should  be  cast 
out.    He  should  be  lifted  up,  like  the  brazen  serpent  in  the  wilderness, 
and  when  so  exalted  He  should  draw  all  men  unto  Him.     The  people 
were  perplexed  at  these  dark  allusions.     They  asked  Him  what  could 
be  the  meaning  of  His  saying  that  "  the  Son  of  Man  should  be  lifted 
up  ?  "     If  it  meant  violently  taken  away  by  a  death  of  shame,  how 
could  this  be  ?     Was  not  the  Son  of  Man  a  title  of  the  Messiah  ?  and 
did  not  the  prophet  imply  that  the  reign  of  Messiah  would  be  eternal  ? 
The  true  answer  to  their  query  could  only  be  received  by  spiritual 
hearts — they  were   unprepared   for  it,  and   would   only  have  been 
offended  and  shocked  by  it;  therefore  Jesus  did  not  answer  them. 
He  only  bade  them  walk  in  the  light  during  the  very  little  while  that 
it  should  still  remain  with  them,  and  so  become  the  children  of  light. 
He  was  come  as  a  light  into  the  world,  and  the  words  which  He  spake 
should  judge  those  who  rejected  Him ;  for  those  words — every  brief 
answer,  every  long  discourse — were  from  the  Father ;  sunbeams  from 
the  Father  of  Lights ;  life-giving  rays  from  the  Life  Eternal. 

But  all  these  glorious  and  healing  truths  were  dull  to  blinded  eyes, 
and  dead  to  hardened  hearts ;  and  even  the  few  of  higher  rank  and 
wider  culture  who  partially  understood  and  partially  believed  them, 
yet  dared  not  confess  Him,  because  to  confess  Him  was  to  incur  the 
terrible  cherem  of  the  Sanhedrin;  and  this  they  would  not  face — 
loving  the  praise  of  men  more  than  the  praise  of  God. 

Thus  a  certain  sadness  and  sense  of  rejection  fell  even  on  the 


THE   LIFE    OF    CHRIST.  337 

evening  of  the  Day  of  Triumph.  It  was  not  safe  for  Jesus  to  stay  in 
the  city,  nor  was  it  in  accordance  with  His  wishes.  He  retired 
secretly  from  the  Temple,  hid  Himself  from  His  watchful  enemies, 
and,  protected  as  yet  outside  the  city  walls  by  the  enthusiasm 
of  His  Gralilaean  followers,  "  went  out  unto  Bethany  with  the 
Twelve."  But  it  is  very  probable  that  while  He  bent  His  steps 
in  the  direction  of  Bethany,  He  did  not  actually  enter  the  village ; 
for,  on  this  occasion,  His  object  seems  to  have  been  concealment, 
which  would  hardly  have  been  secured  by  returning  to  the  well- 
known  house  where  so  many  had  seen  Him  at  the  banquet  on 
the  previous  evening.  It  is  more  likely  that  He  sought  shelter  with 
His  disciples  by  the  olive-sprinkled  slope  of  the  hill,  not  far  from  the 
spot  where  the  roads  meet  which  lead  to  the  little  village.  He  was 
not  unaccustomed  to  nights  in  the  open  air,  and  He  and  the  Apostles, 
wrapped  in  their  outer  garments,  could  sleep  soundly  and  peacefully 
on  the  green  grass  under  the  sheltering  trees.  The  shadow  of  the 
traitor  fell  on  Him  and  on  that  little  band.  Did  lie  too  sleep  as  calmly 
as  the  rest?  Perhaps :  for,  as  Mr.  Fronde  says,  "remorse  may  disturb 
the  slumbers  of  a  man  who  is  dabbling  with  his  first  experiences  of 
wrong ;  and  when  the  pleasure  has  been  tasted  and  is  gone,  and 
nothing  is  left  of  the  crime  but  the  ruin  which  it  has  wrought,  then 
too  the  Furies  take  their  seats  upon  the  midnight  pillow.  But  the 
meridian  of  evil  is,  for  tlie  most  part,  left  unvexed  ;  and  when  a  man  has 
chosen  his  road,  he  is  left  alone  to  follow  it  to  the  end." 


CHAPTER  L. 

MONDAY   IN   PASSION   WEEK — A   DAY   OF   PARABLES. 

RISING  from  His  bivouac  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Bethany  while  it 
was  still  early,  Jesus  returned  at  once  to  the  city  and  the  Temple  : 
and  on  His  way  He  felt  hungry.  Monday  and  Thursday  were  kept  by 
the  scrupulous  religionists  of  the  day  as  voluntary  fasts,  and  to  this 
the  Pharisee  alludes  when  he  says  in  the  Parable,  "  I  fast  twice  in  the 
week."  But  this  fasting  was  a  mere  "  work  of  supererogation," 
neither  commanded  nor  sanctioned  by  the  Law  or  the  Prophets,  and  it 


8?8  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

was  alien  alike  to  the  habits  and  precepts  of  One  who  came,  not  by 
external  asceticisms,  but  with  absolute  self-surrender,  to  ennoble  by 
Divine  sinlessness  the  common  life  of  men.  It  may  be  that  in  His 
compassionate  eagerness  to  teach  His  people,  He  had  neglected  the 
common  wants  of  life ;  it  may  be  that  there  were  no  means  of  pro- 
curing food  in  the  fields  where  He  had  spent  the  night ;  it  may  be 
again  that  the  hour  of  prayer  and  morning  sacrifice  had  not  yet  come, 
before  which  the  Jews  did  not  usually  take  a  meal.  But,  whatever 
may  have  been  the  cause,  Jesus  hungered,  so  as  to  be  driven  to  look 
for  wayside  fruit  to  sustain  and  refresh  Him  for  the  day's  work.  A 
few  dates  or  figs,  a  piece  of  black  bread,  a  draught  of  water,  are 
sufficient  at  any  time  for  an  Oriental's  simple  meal. 

There  are  trees  in  abundance  even  now  throughout  this  region, 
but  not  the  numerous  palms,  and  figs,  and  walnut  trees  which  made 
the  vicinity  of  Jerusalem  like  one  umbrageous  park,  before  they  were 
cut  down  by  Titus,  in  the  operations  of  the  siege.  Fig-trees  especially 
were  planted  by  the  roadside,  because  the  dust  was  thought  to  facilitate 
their  growth,  and  their  refreshing  fruit  was  common  property.  At  a 
distance  in  front  of  Him  Jesus  caught  sight  of  a  solitary  fig-tree,  and 
although  the  ordinary  season  at  which  figs  ripened  had  not  yet  arrived, 
yet,  as  it  was  clad  with  verdure,  and  as  the  fruit  of  a  fig  sets  before 
the  leaves  unfold,  this  tree  looked  more  than  usually  promising.  Its 
rich  large  leaves  seemed  to  show  that  it  was  fruitful,  and  their  un- 
usually early  growth  that  it  was  not  only  fruitful  but  precociously 
vigorous.  There  was  every  chance,  therefore,  of  finding  upon  it 
either  the  late  violet- coloured  Jcermoicses,  or  autumn  figs,  that  often  re- 
mained hanging  on  the  trees  all  through  the  winter,  and  even  until  the 
new  spring  leaves  had  come ;  or  the  delicious  baJckooroth,  the  first  ripe 
on  the  fig-tree,  of  which  Orientals  are  particularly  fond.  The  difficulty 
raised  about  St.  Mark's  expression,  that  "  the  time  of  figs  was  not  yet," 
is  wholly  needless.  On  the  plains  of  Gennesareth  Jesus  must  have 
been  accustomed — if  we  may  trust  Josephus — to  see  the  figs  hanging 
ripe  on  the  trees  every  month  in  the  year  excepting  January  and 
February ;  and  there  is  to  this  day,  in  Palestine,  a  kind  of  white  or 
early  fig  which  ripens  in  spring,  and  much  before  the  ordinary  or 
black  fig.  On  many  grounds,  therefore,  Jesus  might  well  have 
expected  to  find  a  few  figs  to  satisfy  the  cravings  of  hunger  on  this 
fair-promising  leafy  tree,  although  tho  ordinary  fig-season  had  not  yet 
arrived. 

But  when  He  came  up  to  it,  He  was  disappointed.     The  sap  was 


THE   LIFE   OF   CUBIST.  339 

circulating ;  the  leaves  made  a  fair  show  ;  but  of_f ruit  there  was  none. 
Fit  emblem  of  a  hypocrite,  whose  external  semblance  is  a  delusion 
and  a  sham — fit  emblem  of  the  nation  in  whom  the  ostentatious  pro- 
fession of  religion  brought  forth  no  "  fruit  of  good  living " — the 
tree  was  barren.  And  it  was  hopelessly  barren;  for  had  it  been 
fruitful  the  previous  year,  there  would  still  have  been  some  of  the  Jeer- 
mouses  hidden  under  those  broad  leaves  ;  and  had  it  been  fruitful 
this  year,  *he  bakkooroth  would  have  set  into  green  and  delicious 
fragrance  before  the  leaves  appeared ;  but  on  this  fruitless  tree  there 
was  neither  any  promise  for  the  future,  nor  any  gleanings  from 
the  past.  V;  " 

And  therefore,  since  it  was  but  deceptive  and  useless,  a  barren  cum- 
berer  of  the  ground,  He  made  it  the  eternal  warning  against  a  life  of 
hypocrisy  continued  until  it  is  too  late,  and,  in  the  hearing  of  His  dis- 
ciples, uttered  upon  it  the  solemn  fiat,  "  Never  fruit  grow  upon  thee 
more  !  "  Even  at  the  word,  such  infructuous  life  as  it  possessed  was 
arrested,  and  it  began  to  wither  away. 

The  criticisms  upon  this  miracle  have  been  singularly  idle  and  sin- 
gularly irreverent,  because  they  have  been  based  for  the  mosb  part  on 
ignorance  or  on  prejudice.  By  those  who  reject  the  divinity  of  Jesus, 
it  has  been  called  a  penal  miracle,  a  miracle  of  vengeance,  a  miracle  of 
unworthy  anger,  a  childish  exhibition  of  impatience  under  disappoint- 
ment, an  uncultured  indignation  against  innocent  Nature.  No  one,  I 
suppose,  who  believes  that  the  story  represents  a  real  and  miraculous 
fact,  will  daringly  arraign  the  motives  of  Him  was  performed  it ;  but 
many  argue  that  this  is  an  untrue  and  mistaken  story,  because  it 
narrates  what  they  regard  as  an  unworthy  display  of  anger  at  a  slight 
disappointment,  and  as  a  miracle  of  destruction  which  violated  the 
rights  of  the  supposed  owner  of  the  tree,  or  of  the  multitude.  But, 
as  to  the  first  objection,  surely  it  is  amply  enough  to  say  that  every 
page  of  the  New  Testament  shows  the  impossibility  of  imagining  that 
the  Apostles  and  Evangelists  had  so  poor  and  false  a  conception  of 
Jesus  as  to  believe  that  He  avenged  His  passing  displeasure  on  an  irre- 
sponsible object.  Would  He  who,  at  the  Tempter's  bidding,  refused  to 
satisfy  His  wants  by  turning  the  stones  of  the  wilderness  into  bread, 
be  represented  as  having  "  flown  into  a  rage  " — no  other  expression  is 
possible — with  an  unconscious  tree  ?  An  absurdity  so  irreverent  might 
have  been  found  in  the  Apocryphal  Gospels ;  but  had  the  Evangelists 
been  capable  of  perpetuating  it,  then,  most  unquestionably,  they  could 
have  had  neither  the  capacity  nor  the  desire  to  paint  that  Divine  and 

z  2 


340  THE   LIFE    OF   CHEIST. 

Eternal  portrait  of  the  Lord  Jesus,  which  their  knowledge  of  the 
truth,  and  the  aid  of  God's  Holy  Spirit,  enabled  them  to  present 
to  the  world  for  ever,  as  its  most  priceless  possession.  And  as  for 
the  withering  of  the  tree,  has  the  householder  of  the  parable  been  ever 
severely  censured  because  he  said  of  his  barren  fig-tree,  "  Cut  it  down, 
why  cumbereth  it  the  ground  ?  "  Has  St.  John  the  Baptist  been  ever 
blamed  for  violence  and  destructiveness  because  he  cried,  "  And  now 
also  the  axe  is  laid  unto  the  root  of  the  tree :  every  tree,  therefore, 
which  bringeth  not  forth  good  fruit,  is  hewn  down  and  cast  into  the 
fire  ?  "  Or  has  the  ancient  Prophet  been  charged  with  misrepresenting 
the  character  of  God,  when  he  says,  "  I,  the  Lord,  have  dried  up  the 
green  tree,"  as  well  as  "  made  the  dry  tree  to  flourish  ?  "  When  the 
hail  beats  down  the  tendrils  of  the  vineyard — when  the  lightning 
scathes  the  olive,  or  "  splits  the  unwedgeable  and  gnarled  oak  " — do 
any  but  the  utterly  ignorant  and  brutal  begin  at  once  to  blaspheme 
against  God  ?  Is  it  a  crime  under  any  circumstances  to  destroy  a  use- 
less tree  ?  if  not,  is  it  more  a  crime  to  do  so  by  miracle  ?  Why,  then, 
is  the  Saviour  of  the  world — to  whom  Lebanon  would  be  too  little  for 
a  burnt-offering — to  be  blamed  by  petulant  critics  because  He  hastened 
the  withering  of  one  barren  tree,  and  founded,  on  the  destruction  of 
its  uselessness,  three  eternal  lessons — a  symbol  of  the  destruction  of 
impenitence,  a  warning  of  the  peril  of  hypocrisy,  an  illustration  of  the 
power  of  faith  ? 

They  went  on  their  way,  and,  as  usual,  entered  the  Temple ;  and 
scarcely  had  they  entered  it,  when  they  were  met  by  another  indica- 
tion of  the  intense  incessant  spirit  of  opposition  which  actuated  the 
rulers  of  Jerusalem.  A  formidable  deputation  approached  them,  im- 
posing alike  in  its  numbers  and  its  stateliness.  The  chief  priests — 
heads  of  the  twenty-four  courses — the  learned  scribes,  the  leading 
rabbis,  representatives  of  all  the  constituent  classes  of  the  Sanhedrin 
were  there,  to  overawe  Him — whom  they  despised  as  the  poor  ignorant 
Prophet  of  despicable  Nazareth — with  all  that  was  venerable  in  age, 
eminent  in  wisdom,  or  imposing  in  authority  in  the  great  Council  of 
the  nation.  The  people  whom  He  was  engaged  in  teaching  made 
reverent  way  for  them,  lest  they  should  pollute  those  floating  robes 
and  ample  fringes  with  a  touch ;  and  when  they  had  arranged  them- 
selves around  Jesus,  they  sternly  and  abruptly  asked  Him,  "  By  what 
authority  doest  thon  these  things,  and  who  gave  thee  this  authority  ?  " 
They  demanded  of  Him  His  warrant  for  thus  publicly  assuming  the 
functions  of  Rabbi  and  Prophet,  for  riding  into  Jerusalem  amid  the 


THE   LIFE   OF   CIIBIST.  341 

hosannas  of  attendant  crowds,  for  purging  the  Temple  of  the  traffickers, 
at  whose  presence  they  connived  ? 

The  answer  surprised  and  confounded  them.  With  that  infinite 
presence  of  mind,  of  which  the  world's  history  furnishes  no  parallel, 
and  which  remained  calm  under  the  worst  assaults,  Jesus  told  them 
that  the  answer  to  their  question  depended  on  the  answer  which  they 
were  prepared  to  give  to  His  question.  "  The  baptism  of  John,  was  it 
from  heaven,  or  of  men  ?  "  A  sudden  pause  followed.  "  Answer  me," 
said  Jesus,  interrupting  their  whispered  colloquy.  And  surely  they, 
who  had  sent  a  commission  to  inquire  publicly  into  the  claims  of  John, 
were  in  a  position  to  answer.  But  no  answer  came.  They  knew  full 
well  the  import  of  the  question.  They  could  not  for  a  moment  put  it 
aside  as  irrelevant.  John  had  openly  and  emphatically  testified  to 
Jesus,  had  acknowledged  Him,  before  their  own  deputies,  not  only  as 
a  Prophet,  but  as  a  Prophet  far  greater  than  himself — nay,  more,  as 
the  Prophet,  the  Messiah.  "Would  they  recognise  that  authority,  or 
would  they  not  ?  Clearly  Jesus  had  a  right  to  demand  their  reply  to 
that  question  before  He  could  reply  to  theirs.  But  they  could  not,  or 
rather  they  would  not  answer  that  question.  It  reduced  them  in  fact 
to  a  complete  dilemma.  They  would  not  say  "from  heaven"  because 
they  had  in  heart  rejected  it ;  they  dared  not  say  " of  men"  because 
the  belief  in  John  (as  we  see  even  in  Josephus)  was  so  vehement  and 
so  unanimous  that  openly  to  reject  him  would  have  been  to  endanger 
their  personal  safety.  They  were  reduced,  therefore — they,  the  masters 
of  Israel — to  the  ignominious  necessity  of  saying,  "  We  cannot  tell." 

There  is  an  admirable  Hebrew  proverb  which  says,  "Teach  thy 
tongue  to  say,  '  I  do  not  know.'  "  But  to  say  "  We  do  not  know  "  in 
this  instance,  was  a  thing  utterly  alien  to  their  habits,  disgraceful  to 
their  discernment,  a  death-blow  to  their  pretensions.  It  was  ignorance 
in  a  sphere  wherein  ignorance  was  for  them  inexcusable.  They,  the 
appointed  explainers  of  the  Law — they,  the  accepted  teachers  of  the 
people — they,  the  acknowledged  monopolisers  of  Scriptural  learning 
and  oral  tradition — and  yet  to  be  compelled,  against  their  real  con- 
victions, to  say,  and  that  before  the  multitude,  that  they  could  not  tell 
whether  a  man  of  immense  and  sacred  influence — a  man  who  acknow- 
ledged the  Scriptures  which  they  explained,  and  carried  into  practice 
the  customs  which  they  reverenced — was  a  divinely  inspired  messenger 
or  a  deluding  impostor !  Were  the  lines  of  demarcation,  then,  between 
the  inspired  Prophet  (nali)  and  the  wicked  seducer  (mesith)  so  dubious 
and  indistinct  ?  It  was  indeed  a  fearful  humiliation,  and  one  which 


342  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

they  never  either  forgot  or  forgave  !  And  yet  how  just  was  the 
retribution  which  they  had  thus  brought  on  their  own  heads  !  The 
curses  which  they  had  intended  for  another  had  recoiled  upon  them- 
selves ;  the  pompous  question  which  was  to  be  an  engine  wherewith 
another  should  be  crushed,  had  sprung  back  with  sudden  rebound,  to 
their  own  confusion  and  shame. 

Jesus  did  not  press  upon  their  discomfiture — though  He  well  knew 
— as  the  form  of  His  answer  showed — that  their  "  do  not  know  "  was 
a  "do  not  choose  to  say"  Since,  however,  their  failure  to  answer 
clearly  absolved  Him  from  any  necessity  to  tell  them  further  of  an 
authority  about  which,  by  their  own  confession,  they  were  totally 
incompetent  to  decide,  He  ended  the  scene  by  simply  saying,  "Neither 
tell  I  you  by  what  authority  I  do  these  things." 

So  they  retired  a  little  into  the  background.     He  continued  the 
instruction  of  the  people  which  they  had  interrupted,  and  began  once 
more  to  speak  to  them  in  parables,  which  both  the  multitude  and  the 
members  of  the    Sanhedrin  who  were  present  could  hardly  fail   to 
understand.     And  He  expressly  called  their  attention  to  what  He  was 
about  to  say.     "  What  think-  ye  ?  "  He  asked,  for  now  it  is  their  turn 
to  submit  to  be  questioned ;  and  then,  telling  them  of  the  two  sons, 
of  whom  the  one  first  flatly  refused  his  father's  bidding,  but  afterwards 
repented  and  did  it,  the  other  blandly  promised  an  obedience  which 
he  never  performed,  He  asked,  "  Which  of  these  two  did  his  father's 
will?"     They  could  but  answer  "the  first;"  and  He  then  pointed 
out   to  them  the  plain  and  solemn  meaning  of   their  own  answer. 
It  was,  that  the  very  publicans  and   harlots,   despite   the   apparent 
open  shamelessness  of  their  disobedience,  were  yet  showing  them — 
them,  the  scrupulous  and  highly  reputed  legalists  of  the  holy  nation — 
the  way  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven.      Yes,  these  sinners,  whom  they 
despised  and  hated,  were  streaming  before  them,  through  the  door 
which  was  not  yet  shut.      For  John  had  come  to  these  Jews  on  their 
own  principles  and  in  their  own  practices,  and  they  had  pretended  to 
receive  him,  but  had  not;  but   the   publicans  and   the  harlots   had 
repented  at  his  bidding.     For  all  their  broad  fringes  and  conspicuous 
phylacteries,  they — the  priests,  the  separatists,  the  Rabbis  of  these 
people — were  worse  in  the  sight  of  God  than  sinners  whom  they  would 
have  scorned  to  touch  with  one  of  their  fingers. 

Then  He  bade  them  "hear  another  parable,"  the  parable  of  the 
rebellious  husbandmen  in  the  vineyard,  whose  fruits  they  would  not 
yield.  That  vineyard  of  the  Lord  of  Hosts  was  the  house  of  Israel, 


THE   LIFE   OF  CUEIST.  343 

and  the  men  of  Judah  were  His  pleasant  plants  ;  and  they,  the  leaders 
and  teachers,  -were  those  to  whom  the  Lord  of  the  vineyard  would 
naturally  look  for  the  rendering  of  the  produce.  But  in  spite  of 
all  that  He  had  done  for  His  vineyard,  there  were  no  grapes,  or  only 
wild  grapes.  "He  looked  for  judgment,  but  behold  oppression;  for 
righteousness,  but  behold  a  cry."  And  since  they  could  not  render  any 
produce,  and  dared  not  own  the  barren  f ruitlessness,  for  which  they,  the 
husbandmen,  were  responsible,  they  insulted,  and  beat,  and  wounded) 
and  slew  messenger  after  messenger  whom  the  Lord  of  the  vineyard  sent 
to  them.  Last  of  all,  He  sent  His  Son,  and  that  Son — though  they 
recognised  Him,  and  could  not  biit  recognise  him — they  beat,  and 
flung  forth,  and  slew.  When  the  Lord  of  the  vineyard  came,  what 
would  He  do  to  them  ?  Either  the  people,  out  of  honest  conviction} 
or  the  listening  Pharisees,  to  show  their  apparent  contempt  for  what 
they  could  not  fail  to  see  was  the  point  of  the  parable,  answered  that 
He  would  wretchedly  destroy  those  wretches,  and  let  out  the  vineyard 
to  worthier  and  more  faithful  husbandmen.  A  second  time  they  had 
been  compelled  to  an  admission,  which  fatally,  out  of  their  own 
mouths,  condemned  themselves ;  they  had  confessed  with  their  own 
lips  that  it  would  be  in  accordance  with  God's  justice  to  deprive  them 
of  their  exclusive  rights,  and  to  give  them  to  the  Gentiles. 

And  to  show  them  that  their  own  Scriptures  had  prophecied  of 
this  their  conduct,  He  asked  them  whether  they  had  never  read  (in 
the  118th  Psalm)  of  the  stone  which  the  builders  rejected,  which 
nevertheless,  by  the  marvellous  purpose  of  God,  became  the  headstone 
of  the  corner  ?  How  could  they  remain  builders  any  longer,  when  the 
whole  design  of  their  workmanship  was  thus  deliberately  overruled 
and  set  aside  ?  Did  not  their  old  Messianic  prophecy  clearly  imply 
that  God  would  call  other  builders  to  the  work  of  His  Temple  ?  "Woe 
to  them  who  even  stumbled — as  they  were  doing — at  that  rejected 
stone ;  but  even  yet  there  was  time  for  them  to  avoid  the  more  crush- 
ing annihilation  of  those  on  whom  that  stone  should  fall.  To  reject 
Him  in  His  humanity  and  humiliation  involved  pain  and  loss  ;  but  to 
be  found  still  rejecting  Him  when  He  should  come  again  in  His  glory, 
would  not  this  be  "  utter  destruction  from  the  presence  of  the  Lord  ?  " 
To  sit  on  the  seat  of  judgment  and  condemn  Him — this  should  be 
ruin  to  them  and  their  nation ;  but  to  be  condemned  by  Him,  would 
not  thia  be  to  be  "  ground  to  powder  ?  " 

They  saw  now,  more  clearly  than  ever,  the  whole  bent  and  drift  of 
these  parables,  and  longed  for  the  hour  of  vengeance !  But,  as  yet, 


344  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

fear  restrained  them ;  for,  to  the  multitude,  Christ  was  still  o 
prophet. 

One  more  warning  utterance  He  spoke  on  this  Day  of  Parables — 
the  Parable  of  the  Marriage  of  the  King's  Son.  In  its  basis  and 
framework  it  closely  resembled  the  Parable  of  the  Great  Supper 
uttered,  during  His  last  journey,  at  a  Pharisee's  house ;  but  in  many 
of  its  details,  and  in  its  entire  conclusion,  it  was  different.  Here  the 
ungrateful  subjects  who  receive  the  invitation,  not  only  make  light  of 
it,  and  pursue  undisturbed  their  worldly  avocations,  but  some  of  them 
actually  insult  and  murder  the  messenger  who  had  invited  them,  and 
— a  point  at  which  the  history  merges  into  prophecy — are  destroyed 
and  their  city  burned.  And  the  rest  of  the  story  points  to  yet  further 
scenes,  pregnant  with  still  deeper  meanings.  Others  are  invited ;  the 
wedding  feast  is  furnished  with  guests  both  bad  and  good ;  the  king 
comes  in,  and  notices  one  who  had  thrust  himself  into  the  company 
in  his  own  rags,  without  providing  or  accepting  the  wedding  garment, 
which  the  commonest  courtesy  required. 

This  rude  intruding  presumptuous  guest  is  cast  forth  by  attendant 
angels  into  outer  darkness,  where  shall  be  weeping  and  gnashing  of 
teeth  ;  and  then  follows,  for  the  last  time,  the  warning  urged  in  vary- 
ing similitudes,  with  a  frequency  commensurate  to  its  importance, 
that  "  many  are  called,  but  few  are  chosen." 

Teachings  so  obvious  in  their  import  filled  the  minds  of  the  leading 
Priests  and  Pharisees  with  a  more  and  more  bitter  rage.  He  had 
begun  the  day  by  refusing  to  answer  their  dictatorial  question,  and  by 
more  than  justifying  that  refusal.  His  counter-question  had  not  only 
shown  His  calm  superiority  to  the  influence  which  they  so  haughtily 
exercised  over  the  people,  but  had  reduced  them  to  the  ignominious 
silence  of  an  hypocrisy,  which  was  forced  to  shield  itself  under  the 
excuse  of  incompetence.  Then  followed  His  parables.  In  the  first 
of  these  He  had  convicted  them  of  false  professions,  unaccompanied 
by  action  ;  in  the  second,  He  had  depicted  the  trust  and  responsibility 
of  their  office,  and  had  indicated  a  terrible  retribution  for  its  cruel 
and  profligate  abuse ;  in  the  third,  He  had  indicated  alike  the  punish- 
ment which  would  ensue  upon  a  violent  rejection  of  His  invita- 
tions, and  the  impossibility  of  deceiving  the  eye  of  His  Heavenly 
Father  by  a  mere  nominal  and  pretended  acceptance.  Lying  lip- 
service,  faithless  rebellion,  blind  presumption,  such  were  the  sins 
which  He  had  striven  to  bring  home  to  their  consciences.  And  this 
was  but  a  superficial  outline  of  all  the  heart-searching  power  with 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  345 

\vhich  His  words  had  been  to  them  like  a  sword  of  the  Spirit,  piercing 
even  to  the  dividing  of  the  joints  and  marrow.  But  to  bad  men 
nothing  is  so  maddening  as  the  exhibition  of  their  own  self-deception. 
So  great  was  the  hardly-concealed  fury  of  the  Jewish  hierarchy,  that 
they  would  gladly  have  seized  Him  that  very  hour.  Fear  restrained 
them,  and  He  was  suffered  to  retire  unmolested  to  His  quiet  resting- 
place.  But,  either  that  night  or  early  on  the  following  morning,  His 
enemies  held  another  council — at  this  time  they  seem  to  have  held 
them  almost  daily — to  see  if  they  could  not  make  one  more  combined, 
systematic,  overwhelming  effort  "to  entangle  Him  in  His  talk,"  to 
convict  Him  of  ignorance  or  of  error,  to  shake  His  credit  with  the 
multitude,  or  embroil  Him  in  dangerous  relations  towards  the  civil 
authority.  "We  shall  see  in  the  following  chapter  the  result  of  their 
machinations. 


CHAPTER  LI. 

THE   DAT  OF  TEMPTATIONS — THE   LAST  AND  GREATEST  DAT  OF  THE 
PUBLIC   MINISTRT  OF  JESUS. 

ON  the  following  morning  Jesus  rose  with  His  disciples  to  enter  for  the 
last  time  the  Temple  Courts.  On  their  way  they  passed  the  solitary 
fig-tree,  no  longer  gay  with  its  false  leafy  garniture,  but  shrivelled, 
from  the  root  upwards,  in  every  bough.  The  quick  eye  of  Peter 
was  the  first  to  notice  it,  and  he  exclaimed,  "Master,  behold  the 
fig-tree  which  thou  cursedst  is  withered  away."  The  disciples 
stopped  to  look  at  it,  and  to  express  their  astonishment  at  the 
rapidity  with  which  the  denunciation  had  been  fulfilled.  What 
struck  them  most  was  the  power  of  Jesus ;  the  deeper  meanings  of 
His  symbolic  act  they  seem  for  the  time  to  have  missed ;  and,  leaving 
these  lessons  to  dawn  upon  them  gradually,  Jesus  addressed  the  mood 
of  their  minds  at  the  moment,  and  told  them  that  if  they  would  but 
have  faith  in  God — faith  which  should  enable  them  to  offer  up  their 
prayers  with  perfect  and  unwavering  confidence — they  should  not 
only  be  able  to  perform  such  a  wonder  as  that  done  to  the  fig-tree, 
but  even  "  if  they  bade  this  mountain  " — and  as  He  spoke  He  may 


346  THE    LIFE    OF   CHE1ST. 

hare  pointed  either  to  Olivet  or  to  Moriah — "  to  be  removed,  and  cast 
into  the  sea,  it  should  obey  them."  But,  since  in  this  one  instance  the 
power  had  been  put  forth  to  destroy,  He  added  a  very  important 
warning.  They  were  not  to  suppose  that  this  emblematic  act  gave 
them  any  licence  to  wield  the  sacred  powers  which  faith  and  prayer 
would  bestow  on  them,  for  purposes  of  anger  or  vengeance ;  nay,  no 
power  was  possible  to  the  heart  that  knew  not  how  to  forgive,  and  the 
unforgiving  heart  could  never  be  forgiven.  The  sword,  and  the  famine, 
and  the  pestilence  were  to  be  no  instruments  for  them  to  wield,  nor 
were  they  even  to  dream,  of  evoking  against  their  enemies  the  fire  of 
heaven  or  the  "  icy  wind  of  death."  The  secret  of  successful  prayer 
was  faith ;  the  road  to  faith  in  God  lay  through  pardon  of  transgres- 
sion ;  pardon  was  possible  to  them  alone  who  were  ready  to  pardon 
others. 

He  was  scarcely  seated  in  the  Temple  when  the  result  of  the 
machinations  of  His  enemies  on  the  previous  evening  showed  itself 
in  a  new  kind  of  strategy,  involving  one  of  the  most  perilous  and 
deeply  laid  of  all  the  schemes  to  entrap  and  ruin  Him.  The  deadly 
nature  of  the  plot  appeared  in  the  fact  that,  to  carry  it  out,  the 
Pharisees  were  united  in  ill-omened  conjunction  with  the  Herodians ; 
so  that  two  parties,  usually  ranked  against  each  other  in  strong  oppo- 
sition, were  now  reconciled  in  a  conspiracy  for  the  ruin  of  their  com- 
mon enemy.  Devotees  and  sycophants — hierarchical  scrupulosity  and 
political  indifferentism — the  school  of  theocratic  zeal  and  the  school 
of  crafty  expediency — were  thus  united  to  dismay  and  perplex  Him. 
The  Herodians  occur  but  seldom  in  the  Gospel  narrative.  Their  very 
designation  —  a  Latinised  adjective  applied  to  the  Greek-speaking 
courtiers  of  an  Edomite  prince  who,  by  Roman  intervention,  had  be- 
come a  Judoean  king — showed  at  once  their  hybrid  origin.  Their 
existence  had  mainly  a  political  significance,  and  they  stood  out- 
side the  current  of  religious  life,  except  so  far  as  their  Hellenising 
tendencies  and  worldly  interests  led  them  to  show  an  ostentatious 
disregard  for  the  Mosaic  law.  They  were,  in  fact,  mere  provincial 
courtiers ;  men  who  basked  in  the  sunshine  of  a  petty  tyranny  which, 
for  their  own  personal  ends,  they  were  anxious  to  uphold.  To  strengthen 
the  family  of  Herod  by  keeping  it  on  good  terms  with  Roman  impe- 
rialism, and  to  effect  this  good  understanding  by  repressing  every  dis- 
tinctively Jewish  aspiration — this  was  their  highest  aim.  And  in 
order  to  do  this  they  Grsecised  their  Semitic  names,  adopted  ethnic 
habits,  frequented  amphitheatres,  familiarly  accepted  the  symbols  of 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  347 

heathen  supremacy,  even  -went  so  far  as  to  obliterate,  by  such  artificial 
means  as  they  could,  the  distinctive  and  covenant  symbol  of  Hebrew 
nationality.  That  the  Pharisees  should  tolerate  even  the  most  tem- 
porary partnership  with  such  men  as  these,  whose  very  existence  was 
a  violent  outrage  on  their  most  cherished  prejudices,  enables  us  to 
gauge  more  accurately  the  extreme  virulence  of  hatred  with  which 
Jesus  had  inspired  them.  And  that  hatred  was  destined  to  become 
deadlier  still.  It  was  already  at  red- heat;  the  words  and  deeds  of 
this  day  were  to  raise  it  to  its  whitest  intensity  of  wrath. 

The  Herodians  might  come  before  Jesus  without  raising  a  suspicion 
of  sinister  motives  ;  but  the  Pharisees,  astutely  anxious  to  put  Him  off 
his  guard,  did  not  come  to  Him  in  person.  They  sent  some  of  their 
younger  scholars,  who  (already  adepts  in  hypocrisy)  were  to  approach 
Him  as  though  in  all  the  guileless  simplicity  of  an  inquiring  spirit. 
They  evidently  designed  to  raise  the  impression  that  a  dispute  had 
occurred  between  them  and  the  Herodians,  and  that  they  desired  to 
settle  it  by  referring  the  decision  of  the  question  at  issue  to  the  final 
and  higher  authority  of  the  Great  Prophet.  They  came  to  Him  circum- 
spectly, deferentially,  courteously.  "  Rabbi,"  they  said  to  Him  with  nat- 
tering earnestness,  "  we  know  that  thou  art  true,  and  teachest  the  way 
of  God  in  truth,  neither  carest  thou  for  any  man  ;  for  thou  regardest 
not  the  person  of  men."  It  was  as  though  they  would  entreat  Him, 
without  fear  or  favour,  confidentially  to  give  them  His  private  opinion; 
and  as  though  they  really  wanted  His  opinion  for  their  own  guidance  in 
a  moral  question  of  practical  importance,  and  were  quite  sure  that  He 
alone  could  resolve  their  distressing  uncertainty.  But  why  all  this  sly 
undulatory  approach  and  serpentine  ensalivation  ?  The  forked  tongue 
and  the  envenomed  fang  appeared  in  a  moment.  "  Tell  us,  therefore," 
since  you  are  so  wise,  so  true,  so  courageous — "  tell  us,  therefore,  is  it 
lawful  to  give  tribute  to  Caesar,  or  not  ? "  This  capitation  tax, 
which  we  all  so  much  detest,  but  the  legality  of  which  these  Herodians 
support,  ought  we,  or  ought  we  not,  to  pay  it  ?  Which  of  us  is  in  the 
right  ? — we  who  loathe  and  resent,  or  the  Herodians  who  delight 
in  it? 

He  mtist,  they  thought,  answer  "  Yes "  or  "  No ; "  there  is  no 
possible  escape  from  a  plain  question  so  cautiously,  sincerely,  and 
respectfully  put.  Perhaps  he  will  answer,  "  Yes,  it  is  lawful."  If  so, 
all  apprehension  of  Him  on  the  part  of  the  Herodians  will  be  removed, 
for  then  He  will  not  be  likely  to  endanger  them  or  their  views.  For 
although  there  is  something  which  looks  dangerous  in  this  common 


348  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

enthusiasm  for  Him,  yet  if  one,  whom  they  take  to  be  the  Messiah, 
should  openly  adhere  to  a  heathen  tyranny,  and  sanction  its  most 
galling  imposition,  such  a  decision  will  at  once  explode  and  evaporate 
any  regard  which  the  people  may  feel  for  Him.  If,  on  the  other  hand, 
as  is  all  but  certain,  He  should  adopt  the  views  of  His  countryman 
Judas  the  Gaulonite,  and  answer,  "No,  it  is  not  lawful,"  then,  in  that 
case  too,  we  are  equally  rid  of  Him ;  for  then  He  is  in  open  rebellion 
against  the  Roman  power,  and  these  new  Herodian  friends  of  ours  can 
at  once  hand  Him  over  to  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Procurator.  Pontius 
Pilatus  will  deal  very  roughly  with  His  pretensions,  and  will,  if  need 
be,  without  the  slightest  hesitation,  mingle  His  blood,  as  he  has  done 
the  blood  of  other  Galilseans,  with  the  blood  of  the  sacrifices. 

They  must  have  awaited  the  answer  with  breathless  interest ;  but 
even  if  they  succeeded  in  concealing  the  hate  which  gleamed  in  their 
eyes,  Jesus  at  once  saw  the  sting  and  heard  the  hiss  of  the  Pharisaic 
serpent.  They  had  fawned  on  Him  with  their  "  Rabbi,"  and  "  true," 
and  "  impartial,"  and  "  fearless  ;  "  He  "  blights  them  with  the  flash  " 
of  one  indignant  word,  "Hypocrites!"  That  word  must  have  un- 
deceived their  hopes,  and  crumbled  their  craftiness  into  dust.  "Why 
tempt  ye  me,  ye  hypocrites  ?  Bring  me  the  tribute-money."  They 
would  not  be  likely  to  carry  with  them  the  hated  Roman  coinage  with 
its  heathen  symbols,  though  they  might  have  been  at  once  able  to  pro- 
duce from  their  girdles  the  Temple  shekel.  But  they  would  only  have 
to  step  outside  the  Court  of  the  Gentiles,  and  borrow  from  the  money- 
changers' tables  a  current  Roman  coin.  While  the  people  stood  round 
in  wondering  silence  they  brought  Him  a  denarius,  and  put  it  in  His 
hand.  On  one  side  were  stamped  the  haughty,  beautiful  features  of 
the  Emperor  Tiberius,  with  all  the  wicked  scorn  upon  the  lip  ;  on  the 
obverse  his  title  of  Pontifex  Maximus  !  It  was  probably  due  to  mere 
accident  that  the  face  of  the  cruel,  dissolute  tyrant  was  on  this  par- 
ticular coin,  for  the  Romans,  with  that  half-contemptuous  concession 
to  national  superstitions  which  characterised  their  rule,  had  allowed 
the  Jews  to  have  struck  for  their  particular  use  a  coinage  which 
recorded  the  name  without  bearing  the  likeness  of  the  reigning  em- 
peror. "  Whose  image  and  superscription  is  this  ?  "  He  asked.  They 
say  unto  Him,  "  Caesar's."  There,  then,  was  the  simplest  possible  solu- 
tion of  their  cunning  question.  "  Render,  therefore,  unto  Ccesar  the 
things  that  are  Caesar's."  That  alone  might  have  been  enough,  for 
it  implied  that  their  national  acceptance  of  this  coinage  answered 
thoir  question,  and  revealed  its  emptiness.  The  very  word  which  He 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  349 

used  conveyed  the  lesson.  They  had  asked,  "  Is  it  lawful  to  give  " 
(Sovvai)  ?  He  corrects  them,  and  says,  "  Render  " — "  Give  back  " 
(aTToBore).  It  was  not  a  voluntary  gift,  but  a  legal  due;  not  a  cheer- 
ful offering  but  a  political  necessity.  It  was  perfectly  understood 
among  the  Jews,  and  was  laid  down  in  the  distinctest  language 
by  their  greatest  Rabbis  in  later  days,  that  to  accept  the  coinage 
of  any  king  was  to  acknowledge  his  supremacy.  By  accepting  the 
denarius,  therefore,  as  a  current  coin,  they  were  openly  declaring 
that  Csesar  was  their  sovereign,  and  they — the  very  best  of  them 
— had  settled  the  question  that  it  was  lawful  to  pay  the  poll- 
tax,  by  habitually  doing  so.  It  was  their  duty,  then,  to  obey 
the  power  which  they  had  deliberately  chosen,  and  the  tax,  under 
these  circumstances,  only  represented  an  equivalent  for  the  advantages 
which  they  received.  But  Jesus  could  not  leave  them  with  this  lesson 
only.  He  added  the  far  deeper  and  weightier  words — "  and  to  God 
the  things  that  are  God's."  To  Caesar  you  owe  the  coin  which  you 
have  admitted  as  the  symbol  of  his  authority,  and  which  bears  his 
image  and  superscription ;  to  God  you  owe  yourselves.  Nothing  can 
more  fully  reveal  the  depth  of  hypocrisy  in  these  Pharisaic  questioners 
than  the  fact  that,  in  spite  of  the  Divine  answer,  and  in  spite  of  their 
own  secret  and  cherished  convictions,  they  yet  make  it  a  ground  of 
clamorous  accusation  against  Jesus,  that  He  had  "forbidden  to  give 
tribute  unto  Ccesar!"  (Luke  xxiii.  2.) 

Amazed  and  humiliated  at  the  sudden  and  total  frustration  of  a 
plan  which  seemed  irresistible — compelled,  in  spite  of  themselves,  to 
admire  the  guileless  wisdom  which  had  in  an  instant  broken  loose 
from  the  meshes  of  their  sophistical  malice — they  sullenly  retired. 
There  was  nothing  which  even  they  could  take  hold  of  in  His  words 
But  now,  undeterred  by  this  striking  failure,  the  Sadducees  thought 
that  they  might  have  better  success.  There  was  something  more 
supercilious  and  offhand  in  the  question  which  they  proposed,  and 
they  came  in  a  spirit  of  less  burning  hatred,  but  of  more  sneering 
scorn.  Hitherto  these  cold  Epicureans  had,  for  the  most  part,  despised 
and  ignored  the  Prophet  of  Nazareth.  Supported  as  a  sect  by  the 
adhesion  of  some  of  the  highest  priests,  as  well  as  by  some  of  the 
wealthiest  citizens — on  better  terms  than  the  Pharisees  both  with  the 
Herodian  and  the  Roman  power — they  were,  up  to  this  time,  less 
terribly  in  earnest,  and  proposed  to  themselves  no  more  important  aim 
than  to  vex  Jesus,  by  reducing  Him  into  a  confession  of  difficulty. 
So  they  came  with  an  old  stale  piece  of  casuistry,  conceived  in  the 


350  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

same  spirit  of  self-complacent  ignorance  as  are  many  of  the  objections 
urged  by  modern  Sadducees  against  the  resurrection  of  the  body,  but 
still  sufficiently  puzzling  to  furnish  them  with  an  argument  in  favour 
of  their  disbeliefs,  and  with  a  "difficulty"  to  throw  in  the  way  of 
their  opponents.  Addressing  Jesus  with  mock  respect,  they  called 
His  attention  to  the  Mosaic  institution  of  levirate  marriages,  and 
then  stated,  as  though  it  had  actually  occurred,  a  coarse  imaginary 
case,  in  which,  on  the  death  without  issue  of  an  eldest  brother,  the 
widow  had  been  espoused  in  succession  by  the  six  younger  brethren, 
all  of  whom  had  died  one  after  another,  leaving  the  widow  still 
surviving.  "  Whose  wife  in  the  resurrection,  when  people  shall  rise," 
they  scoffingly  ask,  "  shall  this  sevenfold  widow  be  ?  "  The  Pharisees, 
if  we  may  judge  from  Talmudical  writings,  had  already  settled  the 
question  in  a  very  obvious  way,  and  quite  to  their  own  satisfaction,  by 
saying  that  she  should  in  the  resurrection  be  the  wife  of  the  first 
husband.  And  even  if  Jesus  had  given  such  a  poor  answer  as  this, 
it  is  difficult  to  see — since  the  answer  had  been  sanctioned  by  men  most 
highly  esteemed  for  their  wisdom — how  the  Sadducees  could  have 
shaken  the  force  of  the  reply,  or  what  they  would  have  gained  by 
having  put  their  inane  and  materialistic  question.  But  Jesus  was 
content,  with  no  such  answer,  though  even  Hillel  and  Shammai 
might  have  been.  Even  when  the  idioms  and  figures  of  His  lan- 
guage constantly  resembled  that  of  previous  or  contemporary  teachers 
of  His  nation,  His  spirit  and  precepts  differ  from  theirs  toto  caelo.  He 
might,  had  He  been  like  any  other  merely  human  teacher,  have  treated 
the  question  with  that  contemptuous  scorn  which  it  deserved ;  but  the 
spirit  of  scorn  is  alien  from  the  spirit  of  the  dove,  and  with  no  con- 
tempt He  gave  to  their  conceited  and  eristic  dilemma  a  most  profound 
reply.  Though  the  question  came  upon  Him  moat  unexpectedly,  His 
answer  was  everlastingly  memorable.  It  opened  the  gates  of  Paradise 
BO  widely  that  men  might  see  therein  more  than  they  had  ever  seen 
before,  and  it  furnished  against  one  of  the  commonest  forms  of  dis- 
belief an  argument  that  neither  Rabbi  nor  Prophet  had  conceived. 
He  did  not  answer  these  Sadducees  with  the  same  concentrated 
sternness  which  marked  His  reply  to  the  Pharisees  and  Plerodians, 
because  their  purpose  betrayed  rather  an  insipid  frivolity  than  a 
deeply-seated  malice;  but  He  told  them  that  they  erred  from  igno- 
rance, partly  of  the  Scriptures,  and  partly  of  the  power  of  God.  Had 
they  not  been  ignorant  of  the  power  of  God,  they  would  not  have 
imagined  that  the  life  of  the  children  of  the  resurrection  was  a  mere 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  351 

reflex  and  repetition  of  the  life  of  the  children  of  this  world.  In  that 
heaven  beyond  the  grave,  though  love  remains,  yet  all  the  mere  earth- 
linesses  of  human  relationship  are  superseded  and  transfigured.  "  They 
that  shall  be  accounted  worthy  to  obtain  that  world,  and  the  resurrec- 
tion from  the  dead,  neither  marry  nor  are  given  in  marriage ;  neither 
can  they  die  any  more ;  but  are  equal  unto  the  angels ;  and  are  the 
children  of  God,  being  the  children  of  the  resurrection."  Then  as  to 
their  ignorance  of  Scripture,  He  asked  if  they  had  never  read  in  that 
section  of  the  Book  of  Exodus  which  was  called  "  the  Bush,"  how 
God  had  described  Himself  to  their  great  lawgiver  as  the  God 
of  Abraham,  and  the  God  of  Isaac,  and  the  God  of  Jacob.  How 
unworthy  would  such  a  title  have  been,  had  Abraham  and  Isaac 
and  Jacob  then  been  but  grey  handfuls  of  crumbling  dust,  or 
dead  bones,  which  should  moulder  in  the  Hittite's  cave!  "He 
is  not  the  God  of  the  dead,  but  the  God  of  the  living :  ye  there- 
fore do  greatly  err."  "Would  it  have  been  possible  that  He  should 
deign  to  call  Himself  the  God  of  dust  and  ashes  ?  How  new,  how 
luminous,  how  profound  a  principle  of  Scriptural  interpretation  was 
this  !  The  Sadducees  had  probably  supposed  that  the  words  simply 
meant,  "I  am  the  God  in  whom  Abraham  and  Isaac  and  Jacob 
trusted ; "  yet  how  shallow  a  designation  would  that  have  been,  and 
how  little  adapted  to  inspire  the  faith  and  courage  requisite  for  an 
heroic  enterprise  !  "I  am  the  God  in  whom  Abraham  and  Isaac  and 
Jacob  trusted ;  "  and  to  what,  if  there  were  no  resurrection,  had  their 
trust  come  ?  To  death,  and  nothingness,  and  an  everlasting  silence, 
and  "a  land  of  darkness,  as  darkness  itself,"  after  a  life  so  full  of 
trials  that  the  last  of  these  patriarchs  had  described  it  as  a  pilgrimage 
of  few  and  evil  years  !  But  God  meant  more  than  this.  He  meant — 
and  so  the  Son  of  God  interpreted  it — that  He  who  helps  them  who 
trust  Him  here,  will  be  their  help  and  stay  for  ever  and  for  ever,  nor 
shall  the  future  world  become  for  them  "  a  land  where  all  things  are 
forgotten." 


352  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

CHAPTER    LIT. 

THE    GREAT   DENUNCIATION. 

ALL  who  heard  them — even  the  supercilious  Sadducees — must  have 
been,  solemnised  by  these  high  answers.  The  listening  multitude 
were  both  astonished  and  delighted ;  even  some  of  the  Scribes,  pleased 
by  the  spiritual  refutation  of  a  scepticism  which  their  reasonings  had 
been  unable  to  remove,  could  not  refrain  from  the  grateful  acknow- 
ledgment, "  Master,  thou  hast  well  said."  The  more  than  human 
wisdom  and  insight  of  these  replies  created,  even  among  His  enemies, 
a  momentary  diversion  in  His  favour.  But  once  more  the  insatiable 
spirit  of  casuistry  and  dissension  awoke,  and  this  time  a  Scribe,  a 
student  of  the  Torah,  thought  that  he  too  would  try  to  fathom  the 
extent  of  Christ's  learning  and  wisdom.  He  asked  a  question  which 
instantly  betrayed  a  false  and  unspiritual  point  of  view,  "  Master, 
which  is  the  great  commandment  in  the  Law  ?  " 

The  Rabbinical  schools,  in  their  meddling,  carnal,  superficial  spirit 
of  word- weaving  and  letter- worship,  had  spun  large  accumulations  of 
worthless  subtlety  all  over  the  Mosaic  law.  Among  other  things  they 
had  wasted  their  idleness  in  fantastic  attempts  to  count,  and  classify, 
and  weigh,  and  measure  all  the  separate  commandments  of  the  cere- 
monial and  moral  law.  They  had  come  to  the  sapient  conclusion  that 
there  were  248  affirmative  precepts,  being  as  many  as  the  members  in 
the  human  body,  and  365  negative  precepts,  being  as  many  as  the 
arteries  and  veins,  or  the  days  of  the  year :  the  total  being  613,  which 
was  also  the  number  of  letters  in  the  Decalogue.  They  arrived  at  the 
same  result  from  the  fact  that  the  Jews  were  commanded  (Numb.  xv. 
38)  to  wear  fringes  (tsitsith)  on  the  corners  of  their  tallith,  bound  with 
a  thread  of  blue ;  and  as  each  fringe  had  eight  threads  and  five  knots, 
and  the  letters  of  the  word  tsitsith  make  600,  the  total  number  of  com- 
mandments was,  as  before,  613.  Now  surely,  out  of  such  a  large 
number  of  precepts  and  prohibitions,  all  could  not  be  of  quite  the 
same  value;  some  were  "light"  (leal),  and  some  were  "heavy" 
(kobhcd).  But  which  ?  and  what  was  the  greatest  commandment  of 
all  f  According  to  some  Rabbis,  the  most  important  of  all  is  that 
about  the  tephillin  and  the  tsitsith,  the  fringes  and  phylacteries ;  and 
"  he  who  diligently  observes  it  is  regarded  in  the  same  light  as  if  he 
had  kept  the  whole  Law." 


TUB   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

Some  thought  the  omission  of  ablutions  as  bad  as  homicide ;  eoroo 
that  the  precepts  of  the  Mislma  were  all  "  heavy  ;"  those  of  the  Law 
were  some  heavy  and  some  light.  Others  considered  the  third  to  be 
the  greatest  commandment.  None  of  them  had  realised  the  great 
principle,  that  the  wilful  violation  of  one  commandment  is  the  trans- 
gression of  all  (James  ii.  10),  because  the  object  of  the  entire  Law  is 
the  spirit  of  obedience  to  Qod.  On  the  question  proposed  by  the 
lawyer  the  Shamrnaites  and  Hillelites  were  in  disaccord,  and,  as  usual, 
both  schools  were  wrong:  the  Shammaites,  in  thinking  that  mere 
trivial  external  observances  were  valuable,  apart  from  the  spirit  in 
which  they  were  performed,  and  the  principle  which  they  exemplified; 
the  Hillelites,  in  thinking  that  any  positive  command  could  in  itself  be 
unimportant,  and  in  not  seeing  that  great  principles  are  essential  to 
the  due  performance  of  even  the  slightest  duties. 

Still  the  best  and  most  enlightened  of  the  Rabbis  had  already 
rightly  seen  that  the  greatest  of  all  commands,  because  it  was  the 
source  of  all  the  others,  was  that  which  enjoined  the  love  of  the  One 
True  God.  Jesus  had  already  had  occasion  to  express  His  approval  of 
this  judgment,  and  He  now  repeats  it.  Pointing  to  the  Scribes' 
tephillin,  in  which  one  of  the  four  divisions  contained  the  "  Shema  " 
(L)eut.  vi.  4) — recited  twice  a  day  by  every  pious  Israelite — He  told 
them  that  that  was  the  greatest  of  all  commandments,  "  Hear,  O 
Israel,  the  Lord  our  God  is  one  Lord;"  and  that  the  second  was  like 
to  it,  "Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbour  as  thyself."  Love  to  God 
issuing  in  love  to  man — love  to  man,  our  brother,  resulting  from  love 
to  our  Father,  God — on  these  two  commandments  hang  all  the  Law 
and  the  Prophets. 

The  question,  in  the  sense  in  which  the  Scribe  had  put  it,  was  one 
of  the  mere  /^a%ctt  i/o/u/cai,  one  of  those  "  strivings  about  the  Law," 
which,  as  they  were  handled  by  the  schools,  were  "  unprofitable  and 
vain."  But  he  could  not  fail  to  see  that  Jesus  had  not  treated  it  in 
the  idle  disputatious  spirit  of  jangling  logomachy  to  which  he  was 
accustomed,  and  had  not  in  his  answer  sanctioned  any  of  the  common 
errors  and  heresies  of  exalting  the  ceremonial  above  the  moral,  or  the 
Tradition  over  the  Torah,  or  the  decisions  of  Sopherim  above  the  utter- 
ances of  Prophets.  Still  less  had  he  fallen  into  the  fatal  error  of  the 
Rabbis,  by  making  obedience  in  one  particular  atone  for  transgression 
in  another.  The  commandments  which  He  had  mentioned  as  the 
greatest  were  not  special  but  general — not  selected  out  of  many,  but 
inclusive  of  all.  The  Scribe  had  the  sense  to  observe,  and  the  candour 

2  i 


5  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

to  acknowledge  that  the  answer  of  Jesus  was  wise  and  noble.  "  Well, 
Master,"  he  exclaimed,  "thou  hast  said  the  truth;"  and  then  he 
showed  that  he  had  read  the  Scriptures  to  some  advantage  by  sum- 
marising some  of  those  grand  free  utterances  of  the  Prophets  which 
prove  that  love  to  God  and  love  to  man  is  better  than  all  whole  burnt- 
offerings  and  sacrifices.  Jesus  approved  of  his  sincerity,  and  said  to 
him  in  words  which  involved  both  gracious  encouragement  and  serious 
warning,  "  Thou  art  not  far  from  the  kingdom  of  heaven."  It  was, 
therefore,  at  once  easier  for  him  to  enter,  and  more  perilous  to  turn 
aside.  When  he  had  entered  he  would  see  that  the  very  spirit  of  his 
question  was  an  erroneous  and  faulty  one,  and  that  "  whosoever  shall 
keep  the  whole  law,  and  yet  offend  in  one  point,  is  guilty  of  all." 

No  other  attempt  was  ever  made  to  catch  or  entangle  Jesus  by  the 
words  of  His  lips.  The  Sanhedrin  had  now  experienced,  by  the  defeat 
of  their  cunning  stratagems,  and  the  humiliation  of  their  vaunted 
wisdom,  that  one  ray  of  light  from  the  sunlit  hills  on  which  His  spirit 
sat,  was  enough  to  dissipate,  and  to  pierce  through  and  through,  the 
fogs  of  wordy  contention  and  empty  repetition  in  which  they  lived  and 
moved  and  had  their  being.  But  it  was  well  for  them  to  be  convinced 
how  easily,  had  He  desired  it,  He  could  have  employed  against  them 
with  overwhelming  force  the  very  engines  which,  with  results  so  futile 
and  so  disastrous,  they  had  put  in  play  against  Him.  He  therefore 
put  to  them  one  simple  question,  based  on  their  own  principles  of 
interpretation,  and  drawn  from  a  Psalm  (the  110th),  which  they 
regarded  as  distinctly  Messianic.  In  that  Psalm  occurs  the  expres- 
sion, "  The  Lord  (Jehovah)  said  unto  my  Lord  (Adonai),  Sit  thou  on 
my  right  hand."  How  then  could  the  Messiah  be  David's  son  ? 
Could  Abraham,  have  called  Isaac  and  Jacob  and  Joseph,  or  any  of  his 
own  descendants  near  or  remote,  his  Lord  ?  If  not,  how  came  David 
to  do  so  ?  There  could  be  but  one  answer — because  that  Son  would 
be  divine,  not  human — David's  son  by  human  birth,  but  David's  Lord 
by  divine  subsistence.  But  they  could  not  find  this  simple  explana- 
tion, nor,  indeed,  any  other ;  they  could  not  find  it,  because  Jesus  was 
their  Messiah,  and  they  had  rejected  Him.  They  chose  to  ignore 
the  fact  that  He  was,  in  the  flesh,  the  son  of  David;  and  when,  as 
their  Messiah,  He  had  called  Himself  the  Son  of  God,  they  had  raised 
their  hands  in  pious  horror,  and  had  taken  up  stones  to  stone  Him. 
So  here  again — since  they  had  rejected  the  clue  of  faith  which  would 
have  led  them  to  the  true  explanation — their  wisdom  was  utterly  at 
fault,  and  though  they  claimed  so  haughtily  to  be  leaders  of  tho 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  355 

people,  yet,  even  on  a  topic  so  ordinary  and  so  important  as  their 
Messianic  hopes,  they  were  convicted,  for  the  second  time  on  a  single 
day,  of  being  "blind  leaders  of  the  blind." 

And  they  loved  their  blindness ;  they  would  not  acknowledge  their 
ignorance ;  they  did  not  repent  them  of  their  fanlts ;  the  bitter  venom 
of  their  hatred  to  Him  was  not  driven  forth  by  His  forbearance ;  the 
dense  midnight  of  their  perversity  was  not  dispelled  by  His  wisdom. 
Their  purpose  to  destroy  Him  was  fixed,  obstinate,  irreversible ;  and 
if  one  plot  failed,  they  were  bnt  driven  with  more  stubborn  sullenness 
into  another.  And,  therefore,  since  Love  had  played  her  part  in  vain, 
"  Justice  leaped  upon  the  stage ;  "  since  the  Light  of  the  World  shone 
for  them  with  no  illumination,  the  lightning  flash  should  at  last  warn 
them  of  their  danger.  There  could  now  be  no  hope  of  their  becoming 
reconciled  to  Him ;  they  were  but  being  stereotyped  in  unrepentant 
malice  against  Him.  Turning,  therefore,  to  His  disciples,  but  in  the 
audience  of  all  the  people,  He  rolled  over  their  guilty  heads,  with 
crash  on  crash  of  moral  anger,  the  thunder  of  his  utter  condemnation. 
So  far  as  they  represented  a  legitimate  external  authority  He  bade 
His  hearers  to  respect  them,  but  He  warned  them  not  to  imitate  their 
falsity,  their  oppression,  their  ostentation,  their  love  of  prominence,  their 
fondness  for  titles,  their  insinuating  avarice,  their  self-exalting  pride. 
He  bade  them  beware  of  the  broadened  phylacteries  and  exaggerated 
tassels — of  the  long  robes  that  covered  the  murderous  hearts,  and  the 
long  prayers  that  diverted  attention  from  the  covetous  designs.  And 
then,  solemnly  and  terribly,  He  uttered  His  eightfold  "  Woe  unto  you, 
Scribes  and  Pharisees,  hypocrites,"  scathing  them  in  utterance  after 
utterance  with  a  flame  which  at  once  revealed  and  scorched.  Woe 
unto  them,  for  the  ignorant  erudition  which  closed  the  gates  of 
heaven,  and  the  injurious  jealousy  which  would  suffer  no  others  to 
enter  in !  Woe  unto  them  for  their  oppressive  hypocrisy  and  greedy 
cant !  Woe  for  the  proselyting  fanaticism  which  did  but  produce  a 
more  perilous  corruption !  Woe  for  the  blind  hair-splitting  folly 
which  so  confused  the  sanctity  of  oaths  as  to  tempt  their  followers 
into  gross  profanity  !  Woe  for  the  petty  paltry  sham-scrupulosity 
which  paid  tithes  of  potherbs,  and  thought  nothing  of  justice,  mercy, 
and  faith  —  which  strained  out  animalculae  from  the  goblet,  and 
swallowed  camels  into  the  heart !  Woe  for  the  external  cleanliness 
of  cup  and  platter  contrasted  with  the  gluttony  and  drunkenness  to 
which  they  ministered  !  Woe  to  the  tombs  that  simulated  the  sanctity 
of  temples — to  the  glistening  outward  plaster  of  hypocrisy  which  did 

2  A  2 


356  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

but  render  more  ghastly  by  contrast  the  reeking  pollutions  of  the 
sepulchre  within!  Woe  for  the  mock  repentance  which  condemned 
their  fathers  for  the  murder  of  the  prophets,  and  yet  reflected  the 
murderous  spirit  of  those  fathers — nay,  filled  up  and  exceeded  the 
measure  of  their  guilt  by  a  yet  deadlier  and  more  dreadful  sacrifice  ! 
Aye,  on  that  generation  would  come  all  the  righteous  blood  shed  upon 
the  earth,  from  the  blood  of  righteous  Abel  to  the  blood  of  Zacharias, 
whom  they  slew  between  the  porch  and  the  altar.  The  purple  cloud 
of  retribution  had  long  been  gathering  its  elements  of  fury  :  upon 
their  heads  should  it  burst  in  flame. 

And  at  that  point  the  voice  which  had  rung  with  just  and  noble 
indignation  broke  with  the  tenderest  pity — "  0  Jerusalem,  Jerusalem, 
thou  that  killest  the  prophets,  and  stonest  them  that  are  sent  unto 
thee,  how  often  would  I  have  gathered  thy  children  together,  even  as 
a  hen  gathereth  her  chickens  under  her  wings,  and  ye  would  not ! 
Behold,  your  house  is  left  unto  you  desolate  !  For  I  say  unto  you, 
Ye  shall  not  see  me  henceforth  till  ye  shall  say,  Blessed  is  He  that 
cometh  in  the  name  of  the  Lord." 

"  Woe  unto  you,  Scribes  and  Pharisees,  hypocrites."  Some  have 
ventured  to  accuse  these  words  of  injustice,  of  bitterness — to  attribute 
them  to  a  burst  of  undignified  disappointment  and  unreasonable 
wrath.  Yet  is  sin  never  to  be  rebuked  ?  is  hypocrisy  never  to  be 
unmasked  ?  is  moral  indignation  no  necessary  part  of  the  noble  soul  ? 
And  does  not  Jewish  literature  itself  most  amply  support  the  charge 
brought  against  the  Pharisees  by  Jesus  ?  "  Fear  not  true  Pharisees, 
but  greatly  fear  painted  Pharisees,"  said  Alexander  Jannaaus  to  his 
wife  on  his  death-bed.  "  The  supreme  tribunal,"  says  B.  Nachaman, 
"  will  duly  punish  hypocrites  who  wrap  their  tallitJis  around  them  to 
appear,  which  they  are  not,  true  Pharisees."  Nay,  the  Talmud  itself, 
with  unwonted  keenness  and  severity  of  sarcasm,  has  pictured  to  us 
the  seven  classes  of  Pharisees,  out  of  which  six  are  characterised  by  a 
mixture  of  haughtiness  and  imposture.  There  is  the  "  Shechemite  " 
Pharisee,  who  obeys  the  law  from  self-interest  (cf.  Gen.  xxxiv.  10)  ;  the 
Tumbling  Pharisee  (nikfi),  who  is  so  humble  that  he  is  always  stumbling 
because  he  will  not  lift  his  feet  from  the  ground;  the  Bleediny 
Pharisee  (kinai),  who  is  always  hurting  himself  against  walls,  because 
he  is  so  modest  as  to  be  unable  to  walk  about  with  his  eyes  open  lest 
he  should  see  a  woman ;  the  Mortar  Pharisee  (medorkia),  who  covers 
his  eyes  as  with  a  mortar,  for  the  same  reason ;  the  Tell-mc-another- 
duty-and-I-will-do-it  Pharisee — several  of  whom  occur  in  our  Lord's 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  357 

ministry;  and  the  Timid  Pharisee,  who  is  actuated  by  motives  of  fear 
alone.  The  seventh  class  only  is  the  class  of  "  Pharisees  from  love," 
who  obey  God  because  they  love  Him  from  the  heart. 

"  Behold,  your  house  is  left  unto  you  desolate !  "  And  has  not 
that  denunciation  been  fearfully  fulfilled  ?  Who  does  not  catch  an 
echo  of  it  in  the  language  of  Tacitus — "  Expassae  repento  delubri 
fores,  et  audita  major  humana,  vox  excedere  Deos."  Speaking  of  the 
murder  of  the  younger  Hanan,  and  other  eminent  nobles  and  hierarchs, 
Josephus  says,  "I  cannot  but  think  that  it  was  because  God  had  doomed 
ihis  city  to  destruction  as  a  polluted  city,  and  was  resolved  to  purge  His 
tnnctuary  by  fire,  that  He  cut  off  these  their  great  defenders  and  well- 
wishers  ;  while  those  that  a  little  before  had  worn  the  sacred  garments 
and  presided  over  the  public  worship,  and  had  been  esteemed  venerable 
by  those  that  dwelt  in  the  whole  habitable  earth,  were  cast  out  naked, 
and  seen  to  be  the  food  of  dogs  and  wild  beasts."  Never  was  a  nar- 
rative more  full  of  horrors,  frenzies,  unspeakable  degradations,  and 
overwhelming  miseries  than  is  the  history  of  the  siege  of  Jerusalem. 
Never  was  any  prophecy  more  closely,  more  terribly,  more  overwhelm- 
ingly fulfilled  than  this  of  Christ.  The  men  going  about  in  the 
disguise  of  women  with  swords  concealed  under  their  gay  robes  ;  the 
rival  outrages  and  infamies  of  John  and  Simon  ;  the  priests  struck  by 
darts  from  the  upper  court  of  the  Temple,  and  falling  slain  by  their 
own  sacrifices ;  "  the  blood  of  all  sorts  of  dead  carcases — priests, 
strangers,  profane — standing  in  lakes  in  the  holy  courts;"  the  corpses 
themselves  lying  in  piles  and  mounds  on  the  very  altar  slopes ;  the 
fires  feeding  luxuriously  on  cedar-work  overlaid  with  gold ;  friend  and 
foe  trampled  to  death  on  the  gleaming  mosaics  in  promiscuous  car- 
nage ;  priests,  swollen  with  hunger,  leaping  madly  into  the  devouring 
flames,  till  at  last  those  flames  had  done  their  work,  and  what  had 
been  the  Temple  of  Jerusalem,  the  beautiful  and  holy  House  of  God, 
was  a  heap  of  ghastly  ruin,  where  the  burning  embers  were  half- 
slaked  in  pools  of  gore. 

And  did  not  all  the  righteous  blood  shed  upon  the  earth  since  the 
days  of  Abel  come  upon  that  generation  ?  Did  not  many  of  that 
generation  survive  to  witness  and  feel  the  unutterable  horrors  which 
Josephus  tells  ? — to  see  their  fellows  crucified  in  jest,  "  some  one  wayi 
and  some  another,"  till  "room  was  wanting  for  the  crosses,  and  crosses 
for  the  carcases  ?  " — to  experience  the  "  deep  silence  "  and  the  kind  of 
deadly  night  which  seized  upon  the  city  in  the  intervals  of  rage  ? — to 
see  600,000  dead  bodies  carried  out  of  the  gates? — to  see  friends 


358  .        THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

fighting  madly  or  grass  and  nettles,  and  the  refuse  of  the  drains  ? — 
to  see  the  bloody  zealots  "gaping  for  want,  and  stumbling  and  stag- 
gering along  like  mad  dogs?" — to  hear  the  horrid  tale  of  the  miserable 
mother  who,  in  the  pangs  of  famine,  had  devoured  her  own  child  ? — 
to  be  sold  for  slaves  in  such  multitudes  that  at  last  none  would  buy 
them? — to  see  the  streets  running  with  blood,  and  the  "fire  of  burning 
houses  quenched  in  the  blood  of  their  defenders?  " — to  have  their  young 
sons  sold  in  hundreds,  or  exposed  in  the  amphitheatre  to  the  sword  of 
the  gladiator  or  the  fury  of  the  lion,  until  at  last,  "since  the  people  were 
now  slain,  the  Holy  House  burnt  down,  and  the  city  in  flames,  there  was 
nothing  farther  left  for  the  enemy  to  do  ?"  In  that  awful  siege  it  is 
believed  that  there  perished  1,100,000  men,  beside  the  97,000  who  were 
carried  captive,  and  most  of  whom  perished  subsequently  in  the  arena 
or  the  mine ;  and  it  was  an  awful  thing  to  feel,  as  some  of  the  sur- 
vivors and  eye-witnesses — and  they  not  Christians — did  feel,  that  "the 
city  had  deserved  its  overthrow  by  producing  a  generation  of  men  who 
were  the  causes  of  its  misfortunes  ; "  and  that  "  neither  did  any  other 
city  ever  suffer  such  miseries,  nor  did  any  age  ever  breed  a  gene- 
ration more  fruitful  in  wickedness  than  this  was,  since  the  beginning  of 
the  world." 


CHAPTER  LIIL 

FAREWELL  TO   THE   TEMPLE. 

IT  must  have  been  clear  to  all  that  the  Great  Denunciation  recorded  in 
the  last  chapter  involved  a  final  and  hopeless  rupture.  After  language 
such  as  this  there  could  be  no  possibility  of  reconciliation.  It  was 
"  too  late."  The  door  was  shut.  When  Jesus  left  the  Temple  His 
disciples  must  have  been  aware  that  He  was  leaving  it  for  ever. 

But  apparently  as  He  was  leaving  it — perhaps  while  He  was  sitting 
with  sad  heart  and  downcast  eyes  in  the  Court  of  the  "Women  to  rest 
His  soul,  troubled  by  the  unwonted  intensity  of  moral  indignation,  and 
His  mind  wearied  with  these  incessant  assaults — another  and  less 
painful  incident  happened,  which  enabled  Him  to  leave  the  actual 
precincts  of  the  House  of  His  Father  with  words,  not  of  anger,  but 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  359 

of  approval.  In  this  Court  of  the  "Women  were  thirteen  chests  called 
shopheroth,  each  shaped  like  a  trumpet,  broadening  downwards  from 
the  aperture,  and  each  adorned  with  various  inscriptions.  Into  these 
were  cast  those  religious  and  benevolent  contributions  which  helped 
to  furnish  the  Temple  with  its  splendid  wealth.  While  Jesus  was 
sitting  there  the  multitude  were  dropping  their  gifts,  and  the  wealthier 
donors  were  conspicuous  among  them  as  they  ostentatiously  offered 
their  gold  and  silver.  Raising  His  eyes,  perhaps  from  a  reverie  of 
sorrow,  Jesus  at  a  glance  took  in  the  whole  significance  of  the  scene. 
At  that  moment  a  poor  widow  timidly  dropped  in  her  little  contribu- 
tion. The  lips  of  the  rich  contributors  may  have  curled  with  scorn  at 
a  presentation  which  was  the  very  lowest  legal  minimum.  She  had 
given  two  prutahs  (more),  the  very  smallest  of  current  coins ;  for  it 
was  not  lawful,  even  for  the  poorest,  to  offer  only  one.  A  lepton,  or 
prutah,  was  the  eighth  part  of  an  as,  and  was  worth  a  little  less  than 
half,  a  farthing,  so  that  her  whole  gift  was  of  the  value  of  less  than  a 
farthing;  and  with  the  shame  of  poverty  she  may  well  have  shrunk 
from  giving  so  trivial  a  gift  when  the  rich  men  around  her  were  lavish- 
ing their  gold.  But  Jesus  was  pleased  with  the  faithfulness  and  the 
self-sacrificing  spirit  of  the  gift.  It  was  like  the  "  cup  of  cold  water  " 
given  for  love's  sake,  which  in  His  kingdom  should  not  go  unrewarded. 
He  wished  to  teach  for  ever  the  great  lesson  that  the  essence  of  charity 
is  self-denial ;  and  the  self-denial  of  this  widow  in  her  pauper  condition 
was  far  greater  than  that  of  the  wealthiest  Pharisee  who  had  contri- 
buted his  gold.  "  For  they  all  flung  in  of  their  abundance,  but  she  of 
her  penury  cast  in  all  she  had,  her  whole  means  of  subsistence."  "  One 
coin  out  of  a  little,"  says  St.  Ambrose,  "is  better  than  a  treasure  out  of 
much ;  for  it  is  not  considered  how  much  is  given,  but  how  much 
remains  behind."  "  If  there  be  a  willing  mind,"  says  St.  Paul,  "  it  is 
accepted  according  to  that  a  man  hath,  and  not  according  to  that  he 
hath  not." 

And  now  Jesus  left  the  Temple  for  the  last  time ;  but  the  feelings 
of  the  Apostles  still  clung  with  the  loving  pride  of  their  nationality  to 
that  sacred  and  memorable  spot.  They  stopped  to  cast  upon  it  one 
last  lingering  gaze,  and  one  of  them  was  eager  to  call  His  attention  to 
its  goodly  stones  and  splendid  offerings — those  nine  gates  overlaid 
with  gold  and  silver,  and  the  one  of  solid  Corinthian  brass  yet  more 
precious ;  those  graceful  and  towering  porches ;  those  bevelled  blocks 
of  marble  forty  cubits  long  and  ten  cubits  high,  testifying  to  the  toil 
and  munificence  of  BO  many  generations;  those  double  cloisters  and 


360  THE   LIFE   OF    CUEIST. 

stately  pillars ;  that  lavish  adornment  of  sculpture  and  arabesque ; 
those  alternate  blocks  of  red  and  white  marble,  recalling  the  crest  and 
hollow  of  the  sea  waves  ;  those  vast  clusters  of  golden  grapes,  each 
cluster  as  large  as  a  man,  which  twined  their  splendid  luxuriance  over 
the  golden  doors.  They  would  have  Him  gaze  with  them  on  the  rising 
terraces  of  courts — the  Court  of  the  Gentiles  with  its  monolithic 
columns  and  rich  mosaic ;  above  this  the  flight  of  fourteen  steps  which 
led  to  the  Court  of  the  Women ;  then  the  flight  of  fifteen  steps  which 
led  up  to  the  Court  of  the  Priests ;  then,  once  more,  the  twelve  steps 
which  led  to  the  final  platform  crowned  by  the  actual  Holy,  and 
Holy  of  Holies,  which  the  Rabbis  fondly  compared  for  its  shape 
to  a  couchant  lion,  and  which,  with  its  marble  whiteness  and  gilded 
roofs,  looked  like  a  glorious  mountain  whose  snowy  summit  was  gilded 
by  the  sun.  It  is  as  though  they  thought  that  the  loveliness  and 
splendour  of  this  scene  would  intercede  with  Him,  touching  His  heart 
with  mute  appeal.  Bat  the  heart  of  Jesus  was  sad.  To  Him  the  sole 
beauty  of  a  Temple  was  the  sincerity  of  its  worshippers,  and  no  gold 
or  marble,  no  brilliant  vermilion  or  curiously-carven  cedar-wood,  no 
delicate  sculpturing  or  votive  gems,  could  change  for  Him  a  den  of 
robbers  into  a  House  of  Prayer.  The  builders  were  still  busily  at 
work,  as  they  had  been  for  nearly  fifty  years,  but  their  work,  unblessed 
of  God,  was  destined — like  the  earthquake-shaken  forum  of  guilty 
Pompeii — to  be  destroyed  before  it  was  finished.  Briefly  and  almost 
sternly  Jesus  answered,  as  He  turned  away  from  the  glittering  spec- 
tacle, "  Seest  thou  these  great  buildings  ?  there  shall  not  be  left  one 
stone  upon  another  which  shall  not  be  thrown  down."  It  was  the  final 
e/c^;a)pw/A«/ — the  "  Let  us  depart  hence  "  of  retiring  Deity.  Tacitus 
and  Josephus  tell  us  how  at  the  siege  of  Jerusalem  was  heard  that 
great  utterance  of  departing  gods ;  but  now  it  was  uttered  in  reality, 
though  no  earthquake  accompanied  it,  nor  any  miracle  to  show  that 
this  was  the  close  of  another  great  epoch  in  the  world's  history.  It 
took  place  quietly,  and  God  "  was  content  to  show  all  things  in  the 
slow  history  of  their  ripening."  Thirty-five  years  afterwards  that 
Temple  sank  into  the  ashes  of  its  destruction  ;  neither  Hadrian,  nor 
Julian,  nor  any  other,  were  able  to  build  upon  its  site  ;  and  now  that 
very  site  is  a  matter  of  uncertainty. 

Sadly  and  silently,  with  such  thoughts  in  their  hearts,  the  little 
band  turned  their  backs  on  the  sacred  building,  which  stood  there  as 
an  epitome  of  Jewish  history  from  the  days  of  Solomon  onwards. 
They  crossed  the  valley  of  Kidron,  and  climbed  the  steep  footpath  that 


THE   LIFE   OP  CHRIST.  361 

leads  over  the  Mount  of  Olives  to  Bethany.  At  the  summit  of  the  hill 
they  paused,  and  Jesus  sat  down  to  rest — perhaps  under  the  green 
boughs  of  those  two  stately  cedar-trees  which  then  adorned  the  summit 
of  the  hill.  It  was  a  scene  well  adapted  to  inspire  most  solemn 
thoughts.  Deep  on  the  one  side  beneath  Him  lay  the  Holy  City, 
which  had  long  become  a  harlot,  and  which  now,  on  this  day — the  last 
great  day  of  His  public  ministry — had  shown  finally  that  she  knew 
not  the  time  of  her  visitation.  At  His  feet  were  the  slopes  of  Olivet 
and  the  Garden  of  Gethsemane.  On  the  opposite  slope  rose  the  city 
walls,  and  the  broad  plateau  crowned  with  the  marble  colonnades  and 
gilded  roofs  of  the  Temple.  Turning  in  the  eastward  direction  He 
would  look  across  the  bare,  desolate  hills  of  the  wilderness  of  Jndaja 
to  the  purpling  line  of  the  mountains  of  Moab,  which  glow  like  a 
chain  of  jewels  in  the  sunset  light.  In  the  deep,  scorched  hollows  of 
the  Gh6r,  visible  in  patches  of  sullen  cobalt,  lay  the  mysterious  waters 
of  the  Sea  of  Lot.  And  thus,  as  He  gazed  from  the  brow  of  the  hill, 
on  either  side  of  Him  there  were  visible  tokens  of  God's  anger  and 
man's  sin.  On  the  one  side  gloomed  the  dull  lake,  whose  ghastly  and 
bituminous  waves  are  a  perpetual  testimony  to  God's  vengeance  upon 
sensual  crime  ;  at  His  feet  was  the  glorious  guilty  city  which  had  shed 
the  blood  of  all  the  prophets,  and  was  doomed  to  sink  through  yet 
deadlier  wickedness  to  yet  more  awful  retribution.  And  the  setting 
sun  of  His  earthly  life  flung  deeper  and  more  sombre  colourings  across 
the  whole  scene  of  His  earthly  pilgrimage. 

It  may  be  that  the  shadows  of  His  thought  gave  a  strange 
solemnity  to  His  attitude  and  features  as  He  sat  there  silent  among 
the  silent  and  saddened  band  of  His  few  faithful  followers.  Not 
without  a  touch  of  awe  His  nearest  and  most  favoured  Apostles — 
Peter,  and  James,  and  John,  and  Andrew — came  near  to  Him,  and  as 
they  saw  His  eye  fixed  upon  the  Temple,  asked  Him  privately,  "When 
shall  these  things  be  ?  and  what  shall  be  the  sign  of  Thy  coming,  and 
of  the  end  of  the  world  ?  "  Their  "  when  ?  "  remained  for  the  present 
unanswered.  It  was  the  way  of  Jesns,  when  some  ignorant  or 
irrelevant  or  inadmissible  question  was  put  to  Him,  to  rebuke  it  not 
directly,  but  by  passing  it  over,  and  by  substituting  for  its  answer 
some  great  moral  lesson  which  was  connected  with  it,  and  could  alone 
make  it  valuable.  Accordingly,  this  question  of  the  Apostles  drew 
from  Him  the  great  Eschatological  Discourse,  or  Discourse  of  the 
Last  Things,  of  which  the  four  moral  key-notes  are  "Beware! "  and 
"  Watch  !  "  and  "  Endure!  "  and  " Pray." 


362  THE   LIFE   OF   CHEiST. 

Immense  difficulties  have  been  found  in  this  discourse,  and  long 
treatises  have  been  written  to  remove  them.  And,  indeed,  the  meta- 
phorical language  in  which  it  is  clothed,  and  the  intentional  obscurity 
in  which  the  will  of  God  has  involved  all  those  details  of  the  future 
which  would  only  minister  to  an  idle  curiosity  or  a  paralysing  dread, 
must  ever  make  parts  of  it  difficult  to  understand.  But  if  we  compare 
together  the  reports  of  the  three  Synoptists,  and  see  how  they 
mutually  throw  light  upon  each  other ;  if  we  remember  that,  in  all 
three,  the  actual  words  of  Jesus  are  necessarily  condensed,  and  are 
only  reported  in  their  substance,  and  in  a  manner  which  admits  of 
verbal  divergencies ;  if  we  bear  in  mind  that  they  are  in  all  probability 
a  rendering  into  Greek  from  the  Aramaic  vernacular  in  which  they 
were  spoken;  if  we  keep  hold  of  the  certainty  that  the  object  of 
Prophecy  in  all  ages  has  been  moral  warning  infinitely  more  than  even 
the  vaguest  chronological  indication,  since  to  the  voice  of  Prophecy  as 
to  the  eye  of  God  all  Time  is  but  one  eternal  Present,  "  one  day  as  a 
thousand  years,  and  a  thousand  years  as  one  day ;  "  if,  finally,  we 
accept  with  quiet  reverence,  and  without  any  idle  theological  phraseo- 
logy about  the  corwmunicatio  idiomatum,  the  distinct  assertion  of  the 
Lord  Himself,  that  to  Him,  in  His  human  capacity,  were  not  known 
the  day  and  the  hour,  which  belonged  to  "  the  times  and  the  seasons 
which  the  Father  hath  kept  in  His  own  power ;  "  if,  I  say,  we  read 
these  chapters  with  such  principles  kept  steadily  in  view,  then  to 
every  earnest  and  serious  reader  I  feel  sure  that  most  of  the  difficulties 
will  vanish  of  themselves. 

It  is  evident,  from  comparing  St.  Luke  with  the  other  Synoptists, 
that  Jesus  turned  the  thoughts  of  the  disciples  to  two  horizons,  one 
near  and  one  far  off,  as  He  suffered  them  to  see  one  brief  glimpse  of 
the  landscape  of  the  future.  The  boundary  line  of  either  horizon 
marked  the  winding-up  of  an  ceon,  the  <rvjne\€ta  awoi/o? ;  each 
was  a  great  reXo?,  or  ending;  of  each  it  was  true  that  the  then 
existing  yevea — first  in  its  literal  sense  of  "  generation,"  then  in  its 
wider  sense  of  "  race " — should  not  pass  away  until  all  had  been 
fulfilled.  And  the  one  was  the  type  of  the  other ;  the  judgment  upon 
Jerusalem,  followed  by  the  establishment  of  the  visible  Church  on 
earth,  foreshadowed  the  judgment  of  the  world,  and  the  establishment 
of  Christ's  kingdom  at  His  second  coming.  And  if  the  vague  pro- 
phetic language  and  imagery  of  St.  Matthew,  and  to  a  less  degree 
that  of  St.  Mark,  might  lead  to  the  impression  that  these  two  events 
were  continuous,  or  at  least  nearly  conterminous  with  each  other,  on 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  363 

the  other  hand  we  see  clearly  from  St.  Luke  that  our  Lord  expressly 
warned  the  inquiring  Apostles  that,  though  many  of  the  signs  which 
He  predicted  would  be  followed  by  the  immediate  close  of  one  great 
epoch  in  the  world's  history,  on  the  other  hand  the  great  consumma- 
tion, the  final  Palingenesia,  would  not  follow  at  once,  nor  were  they  to 
be  alarmed  by  the  troubles  and  commotions  of  the  world  into  any 
instant  or  feverish  expectancy.  In  fact,  when  once  we  have  grasped 
the  principle  that  Jesus  was  speaking  partly  and  primarily  of  the  fall 
of  the  Jewish  polity  and  dispensation,  partly  and  secondarily  of  the 
end  of  the  world — but  that,  since  He  spoke  of  them  with  that  varying 
interchange  of  thought  and  speech  which  was  natural  for  one  whose 
whole  being  moved  in  the  sphere  of  eternity  and  not  of  time,  the 
Evangelists  have  not  clearly  distinguished  between  the  passages  in 
which  He  is  referring  more  prominently  to  the  one  than  to  the  other — 
we  shall  then  avoid  being  misled  by  any  superficial  and  erroneous 
impressions,  and  shall  bear  in  mind  that  before  the  final  end  Jesus 
placed  two  great  events.  The  first  of  these  was  a  long  treading  under 
foot  of  Jerusalem,  until  the  times  of  the  Gentiles  (the  tcaipoi  edv&v, 
i.e.,  their  whole  opportunities  under  the  Christian  dispensation)  should 
be  fulfilled ;  the  second  was  a  preaching  of  the  Gospel  of  the  King- 
dom to  all  nations  in  all  the  world.  Nor  can  we  deny  all  probability 
to  the  supposition  that  while  the  inspired  narrators  of  the  Gospel 
history  reported  with  perfect  wisdom  and  faithfulness  everything  that 
was  essential  to  the  life  and  salvation  of  mankind,  their  abbreviations 
of  what  Jesus  uttered,  and  the  sequence  which  they  gave  to  the  order 
of  His  utterances,  were  to  a  certain  extent  tinged  by  their  own  sub- 
jectivity— possibly  even  by  their  own  natural  supposition — that  the 
second  horizon  lay  nearer  to  the  first  than  it  actually  did  in  the  designs 
of  Heaven. 

In  this  discourse,  then,  Jesus  first  warned  them  of  false  Messiahs 
and  false  prophets ;  He  told  them  that  the  wild  struggling  of  nations 
and  those  physical  commotions  and  calamities  which  have  so  often 
seemed  to  synchronise  with  the  great  crises  of  History,  were  not  to 
trouble  them,  as  they  would  be  but  the  throe  of  the  Palingenesia,  the 
first  birth-pang  of  the  coming  time.  He  prophesied  of  dreadful  per- 
secutions, of  abounding  iniquity,  of  decaying  faith,  of  wide  evangelis- 
ation as  the  signs  of  a  coming  end.  And  as  we  learn  from  many 
other  passages  of  Scripture,  these  signs,  as  they  did  usher  in  the 
destruction  of  Jerusalem,  so  shall  reappear  on  a  larger  scale  before  the 
end  of  all  things  is  at  hand. 


3G4  THE    LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

The  next  great  paragraph  of  this  speech  dwelt  mainly  on  the 
immediate  future.  He  had  foretold  distinctly  the  destruction  of  the 
Holy  City,  and  He  now  gives  them  indications  which  should  fore- 
warn them  of  its  approach,  and  lead  them  to  secure  their  safety. 
When  they  should  see  Jerusalem  encompassed  with  armies — when  the 
abomination  which  should  cause  desolation  should  stand  in  the  Holy 
Place — then  even  from  the  fields,  even  from  the  housetops,  they  were 
to  fly  out  of  Judaea  to  the  shelter  of  the  Trans -Jordanic  hills,  from  the 
unspeakable  horrors  that  should  follow.  Nor  even  then  were  they  to 
be  carried  away  by  any  deceivableness  of  unrighteousness,  caused  by 
the  yearning  intensity  of  Messianic  hopes.  Many  should  cry,  "  Lo 
here !  and  lo  there  !  "  but  let  them  pay  no  heed ;  for  when  He  came, 
His  presence,  like  lightning  shining  from  the  east  even  to  the  west, 
should  be  visible  and  unmistakable  to  all  the  world,  and  like  eagles 
gathering  to  the  carcase  should  the  destined  ministers  of  his  vengeance 
wing  their  flight.  By  such  warnings  the  Christians  were  preserved. 
Before  John  of  Giscala  had  shut  the  gates  of  Jerusalem,  and  Simon  of 
Gerasa  had  begun  to  murder  the  fugitives,  so  that  "  he  who  escaped 
the  tyrant  within  the  wall  was  destroyed  by  the  other  that  lay  before 
the  gates  " — before  the  Roman  eagle  waved  her  wing  over  the  doomed 
city,  or  the  infamies  of  lust  and  murder  had  driven  every  worshipper 
in  horror  from  the  Temple  Courts — the  Christians  had  taken  timely 
warning,  and  in  the  little  Peraean  town  of  Pella,  were  beyond  the 
reach  of  all  the  robbery,  and  murder,  and  famine,  and  cannibalism, 
and  extermination  which  made  the  siege  of  Jerusalem  a  scene  of 
greater  tribulation  than  any  that  has  been  since  the  beginning  of  the 
world. 

Then  Jesus  passed  to  the  darkening  of  the  sun  and  moon,  and  the 
falling  of  the  stars,  and  the  shaking  of  the  powers  of  heaven — signs 
which  may  have  a  meaning  both  literal  and  metaphorical — which 
should  precede  the  appearing  of  the  Son  of  Man  in  heaven,  and  the 
gathering  of  the  elect  from  the  four  winds  by  the  trumpet-blast  of  the 
angels.  That  day  of  the  Lord  should  have  its  signs  no  less  than  the 
other,  and  He  bade  His  disciples  in  all  ages  to  mark  those  signs  and 
interpret  them  aright,  even  as  they  interpreted  the  signs  of  the  coming 
summer  in  the  fig-tree's  budding  leaves.  But  that  day  should  come  to 
the  world  suddenly,  unexpectedly,  overwhelmingly  ;  and,  as  it  should 
be  a  day  of  reward  to  all  faithful  servants,  so  should  it  be  a  day  of 
vengeance  and  destruction  to  the  glutton  and  the  drunkard,  to  the 
hypocrite  and  the  oppressor.  Therefore,  to  impress  yet  more  indelibly 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  365 

upon  their  minds  the  lessons  of  watchfulness  and  faithfulness,  and  to 
warn  them  yet  more  emphatically  against  the  peril  of  the  drowsy  life 
and  the  smouldering  lamp,  He  told  the  exquisite  Parables — so  beauti- 
ful, so  simple,  yet  so  rich  in  instruction — of  the  Ten  Virgins  and  of 
the  Talents ;  and  drew  for  them  a  picture  of  that  Great  Day  of 
Judgment  on  which  the  King  should  separate  all  nations  from  one 
another  as  the  shepherd  divideth  his  sheep  from  the  goats.  On  that 
day  those  who  had  shown  the  least  kindness  to  the  least  of  these  His 
brethren  should  be  accounted  to  have  done  it  unto  Him.  But  then, 
lest  these  grand  eschatological  utterances  should  lead  them  to  any 
of  their  old  mistaken  Messianic  notions,  He  ended  them  with  the  sad 
and  now  half-familiar  refrain,  that  His  death  and  anguish  must  pre- 
cede all  else.  The  occasion,  the  manner,  the  very  day  are  now  revealed 
to  them  with  the  utmost  plainness  and  simplicity :  "  Te  know  that 
after  two  days  is  the  Passover,  and  the  Son  of  Man  is  betrayed  to  be 
crucified." 

So  ended  that  great  discourse  upon  the  Mount  of  Olives,  and  the 
sun  set,  and  He  arose  and  walked  with  His  Apostles  the  short  remain- 
ing road  to  Bethany.  It  was  the  last  time  that  He  would  ever  walk 
it  upon  earth ;  and  after  the  trials,  the  weariness,  the  awful  teachings, 
the  terrible  agitations  of  that  eventful  day,  how  delicious  to  Him  must 
have  been  that  hour  of  twilight  loveliness  and  evening  calm;  how 
refreshing  the  peace  and  affection  which  surrounded  Him  in  the  quiet 
village  and  the  holy  home.  As  we  have  already  noticed,  Jesus  did 
not  love  cities,  and  scarcely  ever  slept  within  their  precincts.  He 
shrank  from  their  congregated  wickednesses,  from  their  glaring 
publicity,  from  their  feverish  excitement,  from  their  featureless 
monotony,  with  all  the  natural  and  instinctive  dislike  of  delicate 
minds.  An  Oriental  city  is  always  dirty;  the  refuse  is  flung 
into  the  streets  ;*  there  is  no  pavement ;  the  pariah  dog  is  the 
sole  scavenger;  beast  and  man  jostle  each  other  promiscuously 
in  the  crowded  thoroughfares.  And  though  the  necessities  of  His 
work  compelled  him  to  visit  Jerusalem,  and  to  preach  to  the  vast 
throngs  from  every  climate  and  country  who  were  congregated  at  its 
yearly  festivals,  yet  He  seems  to  have  retired  on  every  possible  occasion 
beyond  its  gates,  partly  it  may  be  for  safety — partly  from  poverty — 
partly  because  He  loved  that  sweet  home  at  Bethany — and  partly  too, 
perhaps,  because  He  felt  the  peaceful  joy  of  treading  the  grass  that 
groweth  on  the  mountains  rather  than  the  city  stones,  and  could  hold 
gladder  communion  with  His  Father  in  heaven  under  the  shadow  of 


366  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

the  olive-trees,  where,  far  from  all  disturbing  sights  and  sounds,  He 
could  watch  the  splendour  of  the  sunset  and  the  falling  of  the  dew. 

And  surely  that  last  evening  walk  to  Bethany  on  that  Tuesday 
evening  in  Passion  week  must  have  breathed  deep  calm  into  His  soul. 
The  thought,  indeed,  of  the  bitter  cup  which  He  was  so  soon  to  drink 
was  doubtless  present  to  Him,  but  present  only  in  its  aspect  of  exalted 
sacrifice,  and  the  highest  purpose  of  love  fulfilled.  Not  the  pangs 
which  He  would  suffer,  but  the  pangs  from  which  He  would  save ; 
not  the  power  of  darkness  which  would  seem  to  win  a  short-lived 
triumph,  but  the  redeeming  victory — the  full,  perfect,  and  sufficient 
atonement — these  we  may  well,  though  reverently,  believe  to  have 
been  the  subjects  which  dominated  in  His  thoughts.  The  exquisite 
beauty  of  the  Syrian  evening,  the  tender  colours  of  the  spring  grass 
and  flowers,  the  wadys  around  Him  paling  into  solemn  grey,  the  distant 
hills  bathed  in  the  primrose  light  of  sunset,  the  coolness  and  balm  of 
the  breeze  after  the  burning  glare — what  must  these  have  been  to  Him 
to  whose  eye  the  world  of  Nature  was  an  open  book,  on  every  page  of 
which  He  read  His  Father's  name !  And  this  was  His  native  land. 
Bethany  was  almost  to  Him  a  second  Nazareth ;  those  whom  He  loved 
were  around  Him,  and  He  was  going  to  those  whom  He  loved.  Can 
we  not  imagine  Him  walking  on  in  silence  too  deep  for  words — His 
disciples  around  Him  or  following  Him — the  gibbous  moon  beginning 
to  rise  and  gild  the  twinkling  foliage  of  the  olive-trees  with  richer 
silver,  and  moonlight  and  twilight  blending  at  each  step  insensibly 
with  the  garish  hues  of  day,  like  that  solemn  twilight-purple  of  coming 
agony  into  which  the  noon- day  of  His  happier  ministry  had  long  since 
begun  to  fade  ? 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHBIST.  367 

• 

CHAPTER  LIY. 

THE   BEGINNING  OF  THE   END. 

IT  was  inevitable  that  the  burning  words  of  indignation  which  Jesus 
had  uttered  on  this  last  great  day  of  His  ministry  should  exasperate 
beyond  all  control  the  hatred  and  fury  of  the  priestly  party  among 
the  Jews.  Not  only  had  they  been  defeated  and  abashed  in  open 
encounter  in  the  very  scene  of  their  highest  dignity,  and  in  the 
presence  of  their  most  devoted  adherents ;  not  only  had  they  been 
forced  to  confess  their  ignorance  of  that  very  Scripture  exegesis 
which  was  their  recognised  domain,  and  their  incapacity  to  pronounce 
an  opinion  on  a  subject  respecting  which  it  was  their  professed  duty 
to  decide ;  but,  after  all  this  humiliation,  He  whom  they  despised  as 
the  young  and  ignorant  Rabbi  of  Nazareth — He  who  neglected  their 
customs  and  discountenanced  their  traditions — He  on  whose  words,  to 
them  so  pernicious,  the  people  hung  in  rapt  attention — had  suddenly 
turned  upon  them,  within  hearing  of  the  very  Hall  of  Meeting,  and 
had  pronounced  upon  them — upon  them  in  the  odour  of  their  sanctity 
— upon  them  who  were  accustomed  to  breathe  all  their  lives  the 
incense  of  unbounded  adulation — a  woe  so  searching,  so  scathing,  so 
memorably  intense,  that  none  who  heard  it  could  forget  it  for  ever- 
more. It  was  time  that  this  should  end.  Pharisees,  Sadducees,  Hero- 
dians,  Priests,  Scribes,  Elders,  Annas  the  astute  and  tyrannous, 
Caiaphas  the  abject  and  servile,  were  all  now  aroused ;  and,  dreading 
they  knew  not  what  outburst  of  religious  anarchy,  which  would  shake 
the  very  foundations  of  their  system,  they  met  together  probably  on 
that  very  evening  in  the  Palace  of  Caiaphas,  sinking  all  their  own 
differences  in  a  common  inspiration  of  hatred  against  that  long-pro- 
mised Messiah  in  whom  they  only  recognised  a  common  enemy.  It 
was  an  alliance,  for  His  destruction,  of  fanaticism,  unbelief,  and 
worldliness ;  the  rage  of  the  bigoted,  the  contempt  of  the  atheist,  and 
the  dislike  of  the  utilitarian ;  and  it  seemed  but  too  clear  that  from 
the  revengeful  hate  of  such  a  combination  no  earthly  power  was 
adequate  to  save. 

Of  the  particulars  of  the  meeting  we  know  nothing ;  but  the 
Evangelists  record  the  two  conclusions  at  which  the  high  conspirators 
arrived — the  one  a  yet  more  decisive  and  emphatic  renewal  of  tho 
vote  that  He  must,  at  all  hazards,  be  put  to  death  without  delay ;  the 


368  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

other,  that  it  must  be  done  by  subtilty,  and  not  by  violence,  for  fear  of 
the  multitude ;  and  that,  for  the  same  reason — not  because  of  the 
sacredness  of  the  Feast — the  murder  must  be  postponed,  until  the 
conclusion  of  the  Passover  had  caused  the  dispersion  of  the  countless 
pilgrims  to  their  own  homes. 

This  meeting  was  held,  in  all  probability,  on  the  evening  of  Tues- 
day, while  the  passions  which  the  events  of  that  day  had  kindled  were 
still  raging  with  volcanic  energy.  So  that,  at  the  very  moment  while 
they  were  deciding  that  during  that  Easter-tide  our  Passover  should 
not  be  slain — at  that  very  moment,  seated  on  the  slopes  of  Olivet, 
Jesus  was  foretelling  to  His  disciples,  with  the  calmest  certainty,  that 
He  should  be  sacrificed  on  the  very  day  on  which,  at  evening,  the  lamb 
was  sacrificed,  and  the  Paschal  feast  began. 

Accordingly,  before  the  meeting  was  over,  an  event  occurred 
which  at  once  altered  the  conclusions  of  the  council,  and  rendered 
possible  the  immediate  capture  of  Jesus  without  the  tumult  which 
they  dreaded.  The  eight  days'  respite  from  the  bitter  sentence  of 
death,  which  their  terror,  not  their  mercy,  had  accorded  him,  was  to 
be  withdrawn,  and  the  secret  blow  was  to  be  struck  at  once. 

For  before  they  separated  a  message  reached  them  which  shot  a 
gleam  of  fierce  joy  into  their  hearts,  while  we  may  well  imagine  that 
it  also  filled  them  with  something  of  surprise  and  awe.  Conscious  as 
they  must  have  been  in  their  inmost  hearts  how  deep  was  the  crime 
which  they  intended  to  commit,  it  must  have  almost  startled  them 
thus  to  find  "  the  tempting  opportunity  at  once  meeting  the  guilty 
disposition,"  and  the  Evil  Spirit  making  their  way  straight  before 
their  face.  They  were  informed  that  the  man  who  knew  Jesus,  who 
had  been  with  Him,  who  had  been  His  disciple — nay,  more,  one  of  the 
Twelve — was  ready  to  put  an  immediate  end  to  their  perplexities, 
and  to  re-open  with  them  the  communication  which  he  had  already 
made. 

The  house  of  Caiaphas  was  probably  in  or  near  the  Temple  pre- 
cincts. The  gates  both  of  the  city  and  of  the  Temple  were  usually 
closed  at  sundown,  but  at  the  time  of  this  vast  yearly  gathering  it 
was  natural  that  the  rules  should  have  been  a  little  relaxed  for  the 
general  convenience ;  and  when  Judas  slank  away  from  his  brethren 
on  that  fatal  evening  he  would  rely  on  being  admitted  without  diffi- 
culty within  the  city  precincts,  and  into  the  presence  of  the  assembled 
elders.  He  applied  accordingly  to  the  "  captains  "  of  the  Temple,  the 
members  of  the  Levitical  guard  who  had  the  care  of  the  sacred  build- 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  369 

ings,  and  they  at  once  announced  his  message,  and  brought  him  in 
person  before  the  priests  and  rulers  of  the  Jews. 

Some  of  the  priests  had  already  seen  him  at  their  previous  meet- 
ing; others  would  doubtless  recognise  him.     If  Judas  resembled  the 
conception  of  him  which  tradition  has  handed  down — 
"  That  furtive  mien,  that  scowling  eye, 
Of  hair  that  red  and  tufted  fell " — 

they  could  have  hardly  failed  to  notice  the  man  of  Kerioth  as  one  of 
those  who  followed  Jesus — perhaps  to  despise  and  to  detest  Him,  as 
almost  the  only  Jew  among  the  Galilean  Apostles.  And  now  they 
were  to  be  leagued  with  him  in  wickedness.  The  fact  that  one  who 
had  lived  with  Jesus,  who  had  heard  all  He  had  said  and  seen  all  Ho 
had  done — was  yet  ready  to  betray  Him — strengthened  them  in  their 
purpose ;  the  fact  that  they,  the  hierarchs  and  nobles,  were  ready  not 
only  to  praise,  but  even  to  reward  Judas  for  what  he  proposed  to  do, 
strengthened  him  in  his  dark  and  desperate  design.  As  in  water  face 
answereth  to  face,  so  did  the  heart  of  Judas  and  of  the  Jews  become 
assimilated  by  the  reflection  of  mutual  sympathy.  As  iron  sharpeneth 
iron,  so  did  the  blunt  weapon  of  his  brutal  anger  give  fresh  edge  to 
their  polished  hate. 

Whether  the  hideous  demand  for  blood-money  had  come  from  him, 
or  had  been  suggested  by  them ;  whether  it  was  paid  immediately,  or 
only  after  the  arrest ;  whether  the  wretched  and  paltry  sum  given — 
thirty  shekels,  the  price  of  the  meanest  slave — was  the  total  reward, 
or  ouly  the  earnest  of  a  further  and  larger  sum — these  are  questions 
which  would  throw  a  strong  light  on  the  character  and  motives  of 
Judas,  but  to  which  the  general  language  of  the  Evangelists  enables 
us  to  give  no  certain  answer.  The  details  of  the  transaction  were 
probably  but  little  known.  Neither  Judas  nor  his  venerable  abettors 
had  any  cause  to  dwell  on  them  with  satisfaction.  The  Evangelists 
and  the  early  Christians  generally,  when  they  speak  of  Judas,  seem  to 
be  filled  with  a  spirit  of  shuddering  abhorrence  too  deep  for  words. 
Only  one  dark  fact  stood  out  before  their  imagination  in  all  its  horror, 
and  that  was  that  Judas  was  a  traitor ;  that  Judas  had  been  one  of 
the  Twelve,  and  yet  had  sold  his  Lord.  Probably  he  received  the 
money,  such  as  it  was,  at  once.  With  the  gloating  eyes  of  that 
avarice  which  was  his  besetting  sin,  he  might  gaze  on  the  silver 
coins,  stamped  (oh,  strange  irony  of  history !)  on  one  side  with  an 
olive-branch,  the  symbol  of  peace,  on  the  other  with  a  censer,  the  type 
of  prayer,  and  bearing  on  them  the  superscription,  "Jerusalem  the 

2  B 


370  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

Holy."  And  probably  if  those  elders  chaffered  with  him  after  the 
fashion  of  their  race,  as  the  narrative  seems  to  imply,  they  might  have 
represented  that,  after  all,  his  agency  was  unessential ;  that  he  might 
do  them  a  service  which  would  be  regarded  as  a  small  convenience, 
but  they  could  carry  out  their  purpose,  if  they  chose,  without  his  aid. 
One  thing,  however,  is  certain :  he  left  them  a  pledged  traitor,  and 
henceforth  only  sought  the  opportunity  to  betray  his  Master  when  no 
part  of  the  friendly  multitude  was  near. 

What  were  the  motives  of  this  man  ?  Who  can  attempt  to  fathom 
the  unutterable  abyss,  to  find  his  way  amid  the  weltering  chaos,  of  a 
heart  agitated  by  unresisted  and  besetting  sins  ?  The  Evangelists  can 
say  nothing  but  that  Satan  entered  into  him.  The  guilt  of  the  man 
seemed  to  them  too  abnormal  for  any  natural  or  human  explanation. 
The  narratives  of  the  Synoptists  point  distinctly  to  avarice  as  the 
cause  of  his  ruin.  They  place  his  first  overtures  to  the  Sanhedrin  in 
close  and  pointed  connection  with  the  qualm  of  disgust  he  felt  at 
being  unable  to  secure  any  pilferings  from  the  "three  hundred 
pence,"  of  which,  since  they  might  have  come  into  his  possession, 
he  regarded  himself  as  having  been  robbed;  and  St.  John,  who  can 
never  speak  of  him  without  a  shudder  of  disgust,  says  in  so  many 
words  than  he  was  an  habitual  thief  (John  xii.  6).  How  little  insight 
can  they  have  into  the  fatal  bondage  and  diffusiveness  of  a  besetting 
sin,  into  the  dense  spiritual  blindness  and  awful  infatuation  with 
which  it  confounds  the  guilty,  who  cannot  believe  in  so  apparently 
inadequate  a  motive  !  Yet  the  commonest  observance  of  daily  facts 
which  come  before  our  notice  in  the  moral  world,  might  serve  to  show 
that  the  commission  of  crime  results  as  frequently  from  a  motive  that 
seems  miserably  small  and  inadequate,  as  from  some  vast  and  abnormal 
temptation.  Do  we  not  read  in  the  Old  Testament  of  those  that 
pollute  God  among  the  people  "  for  handfuls  of  barley  and  for  pieces 
of  bread ; "  of  those  who  sell  "  the  righteous  for  silver  and  the  poor 
for  a  pair  of  shoes  ?  "  The  sudden  crisis  of  temptation  might  seem 
frightful,  but  its  issue  was  decided  by  the  entire  tenor  of  his  previous 
life ;  the  sudden  blaze  of  lurid  light  was  but  the  outcome  of  that  which 
had  long  burnt  and  smouldered  deep  within  his  heart. 

Doubtless  other  motives  mingled  with,  strengthened — perhaps  to 
the  self -deceiving  and  blinded  soul  substituted  themselves  for — the 
predominant  one.  "  Will  not  this  measure,"  he  may  have  thought, 
"  force  Him  to  declare  His  Messianic  kingdom  ?  At  the  worst,  can 
He  not  easily  save  Himself  by  miracle  ?  If  not,  has  He  not  told  us 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  371 

repeatedly  that  He  will  die ;  and  if  so,  why  may  I  not  reap  a  little 
advantage  from  that  which  is  in  any  case  inevitable  ?  Or  will  it  not, 
perhaps,  be  meritorious  to  do  that  of  which  all  the  chief  priests 
approve  ?  "  A  thousand  such  devilish  suggestions  may  have  formu- 
lated themselves  in  the  traitor's  heart,  and  mingled  with  them  was 
the  revulsion  of  feeling  which  he  suffered  from  finding  that  his  self- 
denial  in  following  Jesus  would,  after  all,  be  apparently  in  vain  ;  that 
he  would  gain  from  it  not  rank  and  wealth,  but  only  poverty  and  per- 
secution. Perhaps,  too,  there  was  something  of  rancour  at  being 
rebuked;  perhaps  something  of  bitter  jealousy  at  being  less  loved 
by  Christ  than  his  fellows;  perhaps  something  of  frenzied  disap- 
pointment at  the  prospect  of  failure ;  perhaps  something  of  despair- 
ing hatred  at  the  consciousness  that  he  was  suspected.  Alas  !  sins 
grow  and  multiply  with  fatal  diffusiveness,  and  blend  insensibly  with 
hosts  of  their  evil  kindred.  "  The  whole  moral  nature  is  clouded  by 
them ;  the  intellect  darkened  ;  the  spirit  stained."  Probably  by  this 
time  a  turbid  confused  chaos  of  sins  was  weltering  in  the  soul  of  Judas 
— malice,  worldly  ambition,  theft,  hatred  of  all  that  was  good  and  pure, 
base  ingratitude,  frantic  anger,  all  culminating  in  this  foul  and  frightful 
act  of  treachery — all  rushing  with  blind,  bewildering  fury  through 
this  gloomy  soul. 

"  Satan  entered  into  him."  That,  after  all,  whether  a  literal  or  a 
metaphorical  expression,  best  describes  his  awful  state.  It  was  a  mad- 
ness of  disenchantment  from  selfish  hopes.  Having  persuaded  himself 
that  the  New  Kingdom  was  a  mere  empty  fraud,  he  is  suffered  to 
become  the  victim  of  a  delusion,  which  led  him  into  a  terrible  con- 
viction that  he  had  flung  away  the  substance  for  a  shadow.  It  had 
not  been  always  thus  with  him.  He  had  not  been  always  bad.  The 
day  had  been  when  he  was  an  innocent  boy — a  youth  sufficiently 
earnest  to  be  singled  out  from  other  disciples  as  one  of  the  Twelve 
— a  herald  of  the  New  Kingdom  not  without  high  hopes.  The  poverty 
and  the  wanderings  of  the  early  period  of  the  ministry  may  have 
protected  him  from  temptation.  The  special  temptation — trebly 
dangerous,  because  it  appealed  to  his  besetting  sin — may  have 
begun  at  that  period  when  our  Lord's  work  assumed  a  slightly 
more  settled  and  organised  character.  Even  then  it  did  not 
master  him  at  once.  He  had  received  warnings  of  fearful 
solemnity  (John  vi.  70)  ;  for  some  time  there  may  have  been  hope 
for  him ;  he  may  have  experienced  relapses  into  dishonesty  after 
recoveries  of  nobleness.  But  as  he  did  not  master  his  sin,  his  sin 

2  B  2 


372  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

mastered  him,  and  led  him  on,  as  a  slave,  to  his  retribution  and  ruin. 
Did  he  slink  back  to  Bethany  that  night  with  the  blood-money  in  his 
bag  ?  Did  he  sleep  among  his  fellow-apostles  ? — All  that  we  know  is 
that  henceforth  he  was  ever  anxiously,  eagerly,  suspiciously  upon  the 
watch. 

And  the  next  day — the  Wednesday  in  Passion  week — must  have 
baffled  him.  Each  day  Jesus  had  left  Bethany  in  the  morning  and 
had  gone  to  Jerusalem.  Why  did  He  not  go  on  that  day  ?  Did  He 
suspect  treachery?  That  day  in  the  Temple  Courts  the  multitude 
listened  for  His  voice  in  vain.  Doubtless  the  people  waited  for  Him 
with  intense  expectation ;  doubtless  the  priests  and  Pharisees  looked 
out  for  Him  with  sinister  hope ;  but  He  did  not  come.  The  day  was 
spent  by  Him  in  deep  seclusion,  so  far  as  we  know,  in  perfect  rest  and 
silence.  He  prepared  Himself  in  peace  and  prayer  for  the  awfulness 
of  His  coming  straggle.  It  may  be  that  He  wandered  alone  to  the 
hilly  uplands  above  and  around  the  quiet  village,  and  there,  under  the 
vernal  sunshine,  held  high  communing  with  His  Father  in  heaven. 
But  how  the  day  was  passed  by  Him  we  do  not  know.  A  veil  of  holy 
silence  falls  over  it.  He  was  surrounded  by  the  few  who  loved  Him 
and  believed  in  Him.  To  them  He  may  have  spoken,  but  His  work 
as  a  teacher  on  earth  was  done. 

And  on  that  night  He  lay  down  for  the  last  time  on  earth.  On 
the  Thursday  morning  He  woke  never  to  sleep  again. 


CHAPTER  LV. 

THE     LAST     SUPPER. 

ON  the  Tuesday  evening  in  Passion  week  Jesus  had  spoken  of  the 
Passover  as  the  season  of  His  death.  If  the  customs  enjoined  by  the 
Law  had  been  capable  of  rigid  and  exact  fulfilment,  the  Paschal  lamb 
for  the  use  of  Himself  and  His  disciples  would  have  been  set  apart  on 
the  previous  Sunday  evening ;  but  although,  since  the  days  of  the 
exile,  the  Passover  had  been  observed,  it  is  probable  that  the  changed 
circumstances  of  the  nation  had  introduced  many  natural  and  perfectly 
justifiable  changes  in  the  old  regulations.  It  would  have  been  a 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  373 

simple  impossibility  for  the  myriads  of  pilgrims  to  provide  themselves 
beforehand  with  a  Paschal  lamb. 

It  was  on  the  morning  of  Thursday — Green  Thursday,  as  it  used 
to  be  called  during  the  Middle  Ages — that  some  conversation  took 
place  between  Jesus  and  His  disciples  about  the  Paschal  feast.  They 
asked  Him  where  He  wished  the  preparation  for  it  to  be  made.  As 
He  had  now  withdrawn  from  all  public  teaching,  and  was  spending 
this  Thursday,  as  He  had  spent  the  previous  day,  in  complete 
seclusion,  they  probably  expected  that  He  would  eat  the  Passover  at 
Bethany,  which  for  such  purposes  had  been  decided  by  rabbinical 
authority  to  be  within  the  limits  of  Jerusalem.  But  His  plans  were 
otherwise.  He,  the  true  Paschal  Lamb,  was  to  be  sacrificed  once  and 
for  ever  in  the  Holy  City,  where  it  is  probable  that  in  that  very  Pass- 
over, and  on  the  very  same  day,  some  260,000  of  those  lambs  of  which 
He  was  the  antitype  were  destined  to  be  slain. 

Accordingly  He  sent  Peter  and  John  to  Jerusalem,  and  appointing 
for  them  a  sign  both  mysterious  and  secret,  told  them  that  on  entering 
the  gate  they  would  meet  a  servant  carrying  a  pitcher  of  water  from 
one  of  the  fountains  for  evening  use  ;  following  him  they  would  reach 
a  house,  to  the  owner  of  which  they  were  to  intimate  the  intention  of 
the  Master  to  eat  the  Passover  there  with  His  disciples  ;  and  this 
householder — conjectured  by  some  to  have  been  Joseph  of  Arimatheea, 
by  others  John  Mark — would  at  once  place  at  their  disposal  a  furnished 
upper  room,  ready  provided  with  the  requisite  table  and  couches. 
They  found  all  as  Jesus  had  said,  and  there  "  made  ready  the  Pass- 
over." There  are  ample  reasons  for  believing  that  this  was  not  the 
ordinary  Jewish  Passover,  but  a  meal  eaten  by  our  Lord  and  His 
Apostles  on  the  previous  evening,  Thursday,  Nisan  13,  to  which  a 
quasi-Paschal  character  was  given,  but  which  was  intended  to  super- 
sede the  Jewish  festival  by  one  of  far  deeper  and  diviner  significance. 

It  was  towards  the  evening,  probably  when  the  gathering  dusk 
would  prevent  all  needless  observation,  that  Jesus  and  His  disciples 
walked  from  Bethany,  by  that  old  familiar  road  over  the  Mount  of 
Olives,  which  His  sacred  feet  were  never  again  destined  to  traverse 
until  after  death.  How  far  they  attracted  attention,  or  how  it  was 
that  He  whose  person  was  known  to  so  many — and  who,  as  the  great 
central  figure  of  such  great  counter  agitations,  had,  four  days  before, 
l>een  accompanied  with  shouts  of  triumph,  as  He  would  be,  on  the 
following  day,  with  yells  of  insult — could  now  enter  Jerusalem  un- 
noticed with  His  followers,  we  cannot  tell.  We  catch  no  glimpse  of 


374  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

the  little  company  till  we  find  them  assembled  in  that  "  large  upper 
room " — perhaps  the  very  room  where  three  days  afterwards  the 
sorrow-strickeA  Apostles  first  saw  their  risen  Saviour — perhaps  the 
very  room  where,  amid  the  sound  of  a  rushing  mighty  wind,  each 
meek  brow  was  first  mitred  with  Pentecostal  flame. 

When  they  arrived,  the  meal  was  ready,  the  table  spread,  the 
triclinia  laid  with  cushions  for  the  guests.  Imagination  loves  to  re- 
produce all  the  probable  details  of  that  deeply  moving  and  eternally 
sacred  scene ;  and  if  we  compare  the  notices  of  ancient  Jewish  custom, 
with  the  immemorial  fashions  still  existing  in  the  changeless  East,  we 
can  feel  but  little  doubt  as  to  the  general  nature  of  the  arrangements. 
They  were  totally  unlike  those  with  which  the  genius  of  Leonardo  da 
Vinci,  and  other  great  painters,  has  made  us  so  familiar.  The  room 
probably  had  white  walls,  and  was  bare  of  all  except  the  most 
necessary  furniture  and  adornment.  The  couches  or  cushions,  each 
large  enough  to  hold  three  persons,  were  placed  around  three  sides  of 
one  or  more  low  tables  of  gaily  painted  wood,  each  scarcely  higher 
than  stools.  The  seat  of  honour  was  the  central  one  of  the  central 
triclinium,  or  mat.  This  was,  of  course,  occupied  by  the  Lord.  Each 
guest  reclined  at  full  length,  leaning  on  his  left  elbow,  that  his  right 
hand  might  be  free.  At  the  right  hand  of  Jesus  reclined  the  beloved 
disciple,  whose  head  therefore  could,  at  any  moment,  be  placed  upon 
the  breast  of  his  friend  and  Lord. 

It  may  be  that  the  very  act  of  taking  their  seats  at  the  table  had, 
once  more,  stirred  up  in  the  minds  of  the  Apostles  those  disputes  about 
precedence  which,  on  previous  occasions,  our  Lord  had  so  tenderly  and 
beautifully  rebuked.  The  mere  question  of  a  place  at  table  might 
seem  a  matter  too  infinitesimal  and  unimportant  to  ruffle  the  feelings 
of  good  and  self-denying  men  at  an  hour  so  supreme  and  solemn ;  but 
that  love  for  "  the  chief  seats  "  at  feasts  and  elsewhere,  which  Jesus 
had  denounced  in  the  Pharisees,  is  not  only  innate  in  the  human  heart, 
but  is  even  so  powerful  that  it  has  at  times  caused  the  most  terrific 
tragedies.  But  at  this  moment,  when  the  soul  of  Jesus  was  fall  of 
such  sublime  purpose — when  He  was  breathing  the  pure  unmingled 
air  of  Eternity,  and  the  Eternal  was  to  Him,  in  spite  of  His  mortal 
investiture,  not  only  the  present  but  the  seen — a  strife  of  this  kin  ! 
must  have  been  more  than  ever  painful.  It  showed  how  little,  as  yet, 
even  these  His  chosen  followers  had  entered  into  the  meaning  of  His 
life.  It  showed  that  the  evil  spirits  of  pride  and  selfishness  were  not 
yet  exorcised  from  their  struggling  souls.  It  showed  that,  even  now, 


TUE    LIFE    OF   CHlilST.  375 

they  had  wholly  failed  to  understand  His  many  and  earnest  warnings 
as  to  the  nature  of  His  kingdom,  and  the  certainty  of  His  fate.  That 
some  great  crisis  was  at  hand — that  their  Master  was  to  suffer  and  be 
slain— they  must  have  partially  realised :  but  they  seem  to  have 
regarded  this  as  a  mere  temporary  obscuration,  to  be  followed  by  an 
immediate  divulgence  of  His  splendour,  and  the  setting  up  on  earth  of 
His  Messianic  throne. 

In  pained  silence  Jesus  had  heard  their  murmured  jealousies,  while 
they  were  arranging  their  places  at  the  feast.  Not  by  mere  verbal 
reproof,  but  by  act  more  profoundly  significant  and  touching,  He 
determined  to  teach  to  them,  and  to  all  who  love  Him,  a  nobler 
lesson. 

Every  Eastern  room,  if  it  belongs  to  any  but  the  very  poorest,  has 
the  central  part  of  the  floor  covered  with  mats,  and  as  a  person  enters, 
he  lays  aside  his  sandals  at  the  door  of  the  room,  mainly  in  order  not 
to  defile  the  clean  white  mats  with  the  dust  and  dirt  of  the  road  or 
sti'eets,  and  also  (at  any  rate  among  Mahometans)  because  the  mat  is 
hallowed  by  being  knelt  upon  in  prayer.  Before  they  reclined  at  the 
table,  the  disciples  had  doubtless  conformed  to  this  cleanly  and  reason- 
able custom;  but  another  customary  and  pleasant  habit,  which  we 
know  that  Jesus  appreciated,  had  been  neglected.  Their  feet  must 
have  been  corsred  with  dust  from  their  walk  along  the  hot  and  much 
frequented  road  from  Bethany  to  Jerusalem,  and  under  such  circum- 
stances they  would  have  been  refreshed  for  the  festival  by  washing 
their  feet  after  putting  off  their  sandals.  But  to  wash  the  feet  was 
the  work  of  slaves  ;  and  since  no  one  had  offered  to  perform  the  kindly 
office,  Jesus  Himself,  in  His  eternal  humility  and  self-denial,  rose  from 
His  place  at  the  meal  to  do  the  menial  service  which  none  of  His 
disciples  had  offered  to  do  for  Him.  Well  may  the  amazement  of  the 
beloved  disciple  show  itself  in  his  narrative,  as  he  dwells  on  every  par- 
ticular of  that  solemn  scene.  "  Though  He  knew  that  the  Father  had 
given  all  things  into  His  hands,  and  that  He  came  from  God  and  was 
going  to  God,  He  arose  from  the  supper  and  laid  aside  His  garments, 
and  taking  a  towel,  girded  Himself."  It  is  probable  that  in  the  utter- 
ness  of  self-abnegation,  He  entirely  stripped  His  upper  limbs,  laying 
aside  both  the  simchah  and  the  cetoneth,  as  though  He  had  been  the 
meanest  slave,  and  wrapping  the  towel  round  His  waist.  Then  pour- 
ing water  into  the  large  copper  bason  with  which  an  Oriental  house  is 
always  provided,  He  began  without  a  word  to  wash  His  disciples'  feet, 
and  wipe  them  dry  with  the  towel  which  served  Him  as  a  girdle. 


376  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

Awe  and  shame  kept  them  silent  until  He  came  to  Peter,  whose  irre- 
pressible emotions  found  vent  in  the  surprised,  half-indignant  question, 
" Lord,  dost  Thou  seek  to  wash  my  feet?  "  Thou,  the  Son  of  God,  the 
King  of  Israel,  who  hast  the  words  of  eternal  life — Thou,  whose  feet 
Oriental  kings  should  anoint  with  their  costliest  spikenard,  and  peni- 
tents bathe  in  precious  tears — dost  thou  wash  Peter's  feet  ?  It  was 
the  old  dread  and  self- depreciation  which,  more  than  three  years  before, 
had  prompted  the  cry  of  the  rude  fisherman  of  Galilee,  "  Depart  from 
me,  for  I  am  a  sinful  man,  0  Lord ;  "  it  was  the  old  self-will  which,  a 
year  before,  had  expressed  itself  in  the  self-confident  dissuasion  of  the 
elated  Man  of  Rock — •"  That  be  far  from  Thee,  Lord;  this  shall  not 
happen  unto  Thee."  Gently  recognising  what  was  good  in  His  im- 
petuous follower's  ejaculation,  Jesus  calmly  tells  him  that  as  yet  he  is 
too  immature  to  understand  the  meaning  of  His  actions,  though  the 
day  should  come  when  their  significance  should  dawn  upon  him.  But 
Peter,  obstinate  and  rash — as  though  he  felt,  even  more  than  his  Lord, 
the  greatness  of  Him  that  ministered,  and  the  meanness  of  him  to 
whom  the  service  would  be  done — persisted  in  his  opposition :  "  Never, 
never,  till  the  end  of  time,"  he  impetuously  exclaims ;  "  shalt  thou 
wash  my  feet  ?  "  But  then  Jesus  revealed  to  him  the  dangerous  self- 
assertion  which  lurked  in  this  false  humility.  "  If  I  wash  thee  not, 
thou  hast  no  share  with  me."  Alike,  thy  self-conceit  and  thy  self- 
disgust  must  be  laid  aside  if  thou  wouldest  be  mine.  My  follower 
must  accept  my  will,  even  when  he  least  can  comprehend  it,  even 
when  it  seems  to  violate  his  own  conceptions  of  what  I  am.  That 
calm  word  changed  the  whole  current  of  thought  and  feeling  in 
the  warm-hearted  passionate  disciple.  "No  share  with  Thee?  oh, 
forbid  it,  Heaven !  Lord,  not  my  feet  only,  but  also  my  hands  and 
my  head  !  "  But  no :  once  more  he  must  accept  what  Christ  wills, 
not  in  his  own  way,  but  in  Christ's  way.  This  total  washing  was  not 
needed.  The  baptism  of  his  initiation  was  over;  in  that  laver  of 
regeneration  he  had  been  already  dipped.  Nothing  more  was  needed 
than  the  daily  cleansing  from  minor  and  freshly-contracted  stains. 
The  feet  soiled  with  the  clinging  dust  of  daily  sins,  these  must  be 
washed  in  daily  renovation ;  but  the  heart  and  being  of  the  man, 
these  were  already  washed,  were  cleansed,  were  sanctified.  "  Jesus 
.saith  to  him,  Ho  that  is  bathed  (XeXou/iei/09)  hath  no  need  save  to 
wash  (vtya<r6at)  his  feet,  but  is  clean  every  whit.  And  yo  are 
clean ; "  and  then  Ho  was  forced  to  add  with  a  deep  sigh,  "  but  not 
all."  The  last  words  wero  an  allusion  to  His  consciousness  of  one 


THE   LIFE   OP   CHRIST.  377 

traitorous  presence ;  for  He  knew,  \vLat  as  yet  they  knew  not,  that  the 
hands  of  the  Lord  of  Life  had  just  washed  the  traitor's  feet.  Oh, 
strange  unfathomahle  depth  of  human  infatuation  and  ingratitude ; 
that  traitor,  with  all  the  black  and  accursed  treachery  in  his  false 
heart,  had  seen,  had  known,  had  suffered  it ;  had  felt  the  touch  of 
those  kind  and  gentle  hands,  had  been  refreshed  by  the  cleansing 
water,  had  seen  that  sacred  head  bent  over  his  feet,  stained  as  they 
yet  were  with  the  hurried  secret  walk  which  had  taken  him  into  the 
throng  of  sanctimonious  murderers  over  the  shoulder  of  Olivet.  But 
for  him  there  had  been  no  purification  in  that  lustral  water ;  neither 
was  the  devil  within  him  exorcised  by  that  gentle  voice,  nor  the 
leprosy  of  his  heart  healed  by  that  miracle-producing  touch. 

The  other  Apostles  did  not  at  the  moment  notice  that  grievous 
exception — "but  not  all."  It  maybe  that  their  consciences  gave  to 
all,  even  to  the  most  faithful,  too  sad  a  cause  to  echo  the  words,  with 
something  of  misgiving,  to  his  own  soul.  Then  Jesus,  after  having 
washed  their  feet,  resumed  His  garments,  and  once  more  reclined  at 
the  meal.  As  He  leaned  there  on  His  left  elbow,  John  lay  at  His 
right,  with  His  head  quite  close  to  Jesus'  breast.  Next  to  John,  and 
at  the  top  of  the  next  mat  or  cushion,  would  probably  be  his  brother 
James ;  and — as  we  infer  from  the  few  details  of  the  meal — at  the  left 
of  Jesus  lay  the  Man  of  Kerioth,  who  may  either  have  thrust  himself 
into  that  position,  or  who,  as  the  holder  of  the  common  purse,  occupied 
a  place  of  some  prominence  among  the  little  band.  It  seems  probable 
that  Peter's  place  was  at  the  top  of  the  next  mat,  and  at  the  left  of 
Judas.  And  as  the  meal  began,  Jesus  taught  them  what  His  act  had 
meant.  Rightly,  and  with  proper  respect,  they  called  Him  "  Master  " 
and  "  Lord,"  for  so  He  was  ;  yet,  though  the  Lord  is  greater  than  the 
slave,  the  Sender  greater  than  His  Apostle,  He  their  Lord  and  Master 
had  washed  their  feet.  It  was  a  kind  and  gracious  task,  and  such 
ought  to  be  the  nature  of  all  their  dealings  with  each  other.  He  had 
done  it  to  teach  them  humility,  to  teach  them  self-denial,  to  teach 
them  love:  blessed  they  if  they  learnt  the  lesson!  blessed  if  they 
learnt  that  the  struggles  for  precedence,  the  assertions  of  claims,  the 
standings  upon  dignity,  the  fondness  for  the  mere  exercise  of  authority, 
marked  the  tyrannies  and  immaturities  of  heathendom,  and  that  the 
greatest  Christian  is  ever  the  humblest.  He  should  be  chief  among 
them  who,  for  the  sake  of  others,  gladly  laid  on  himself  the  lowliest 
burdens,  and  sought  for  himself  the  humblest  services.  Again  and 
again  He  warned  them  that  they  were  not  to  look  for  earthly  reward 


378  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

or  earthly  prosperity ;  the  throne,  and  the  table,  and  the  kingdom,  and 
the  many  mansions  were  not  of  earth. 

And  then  again  the  trouble  of  His  spirit  broke  forth.  He  was 
speaking  of  those  whom  He  had  chosen ;  He  was  not  speaking  of 
them  all.  Among  the  blessed  company  sat  one  who  even  then  was 
drawing  on  his  own  head  a  curse.  It  had  been  so  with  David,  whose 
nearest  friend  had  become  his  bitterest  foe ;  it  was  foreordained  that 
it  should  be  so  likewise  with  David's  Son.  Soon  should  they  know 
with  what  full  foreknowledge  He  had  gone  to  all  that  awaited  Him ; 
soon  should  they  be  able  to  judge  that,  just  as  the  man  who  receives 
in  Christ's  name  His  humblest  servant  rcceiveth  Him,  so  the  rejection 
of  Him  is  the  rejection  of  His  Father,  and  that  this  rejection  of  the 
Living  God  was  the  crime  which  at  this  moment  was  being  committed, 
and  committed  in  their  very  midst. 

There,  next  but  one  to  Him,  hearing  all  these  words  unmoved,  full 
of  spite  and  hatred,  utterly  hardening  his  heart,  and  leaning  the 
whole  weight  of  his  demoniac  possession  against  that  door  of  mercy 
which  even  now  and  even  here  His  Saviour  would  have  opened  to 
him,  sat  Judas,  tho  false  smile  of  hypocrisy  011  his  face,  but  rage,  and 
shame,  and  greed,  and  anguish,  and  treachery  in  his  heart.  The  near 
presence  of  that  black  iniquity,  the  failure  of  even  his  pathetic  low- 
liness to  move  or  touch  the  man's  hideous  purpose,  troubled  the  human 
heart  of  Jesus  to  its  inmost  depths — wrung  from  Him  His  agony  of 
yet  plainer  prediction,  "  Verily,  verily,  I  say  unto  you,  that  one  of  you 
shall  betray  me ! "  That  night  all,  even  the  best  beloved,  were  to 
forsake  Him,  but  it  was  not  that ;  that  night  even  the  boldest-hearted 
was  to  deny  Him  with  oaths,  but  it  was  not  that ;  nay,  but  one  of  them 
was  to  betray  Him.  Their  hearts  misgave  them  as  they  listened. 
Already  a  deep  unspeakable  sadness  had  fallen  over  the  sacred  meal. 
Like  the  sombre  and  threatening  crimson  that  intermingles  with  the 
colours  of  sunset,  a  dark  omen  seemed  to  be  overshadowing  them — a 
shapeless  presentiment  of  evil — an  unspoken  sense  of  dread.  If  all 
their  hopes  were  to  be  thus  blighted — if  at  this  very  Passover,  He  for 
whom  they  had  given  up  all,  and  who  had  been  to  them  all  in  all,  was 
indeed  to  be  betrayed  by  one  of  themselves  to  an  unpitied  and  igno- 
minious end — if  this  were  possible,  anything  seemed  possible.  Their 
hearts  were  troubled.  All  their  want  of  nobility,  all  their  failure  in 
love,  all  the  depth  of  their  selfishness,  all  the  weakness  of  their  faith — 
"  Every  evil  thought  they  ever  thought, 
And  every  evil  word  they  ever  said, 
And  every  evil  thing  they  ever  did," 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  379 

nil  crowded  upon  their  memories,  and  made  their  consciences  afraid. 
None  of  them  seemed  safe  from  anything,  and  each  read  his  own  self- 
distrnst  in  his  brother-disciple's  eye.  And  hence,  at  that  moment  of 
supreme  sadness  and  almost  despair,  it  was  with  lips  that  faltered 
and  cheeks  that  paled,  that  each  asked  the  humble  question,  "Lord, 
is  it  I  ?  "  Better  always  that  question  than  "  Is  it  he  ? " — better 
the  penitent  watchfulness  of  a  self-condemning  humility  than  the 
haughty  Pharisaism  of  censorious  pride.  The  very  horror  that  breathed 
through  their  question,  the  very  trustfulness  which  prompted  it,  in- 
volved their  acquittal.  Jesus  only  remained  silent,  in  order  that  even 
then,  if  it  were  possible,  there  might  be  time  for  Judas  to  repent.  But 
Peter  was  unable  to  restrain  his  sorrow  and  his  impatience.  Eager  to 
know  and  to  prevent  the  treachery — unseen  by  Jesus,  whose  back  was 
turned  to  him  as  He  reclined  at  the  meal — he  made  a  signal  to  John 
to  ask  "who  it  was."  The  head  of  John  was  close  to  Jesus,  and 
laying  it  with  affectionate  trustfulness  on  his  Master's  breast,  he  said 
in  a  whisper,  "Lord,  who  is  it  ?"  The  reply,  given  in  a  tone  equally 
low,  was  heard  by  St.  John  alone,  and  confirmed  the  suspicions  with 
which  it  is  evident  that  the  repellent  nature  of  Judas  had  already 
inspired  him.  At  Eastern  meals  all  the  guests  eat  with  their  fingers 
out  of  a  common  dish,  and  it  is  common  for  one  at  times  to  dip  into 
the  dish  a  piece  of  the  thin  flexible  cake  of  bread  which  is  placed  by 
each,  and  taking  up  with  it  a  portion  of  the  meat  or  rice  in  the  dish, 
to  hand  it  to  another  guest.  So  ordinary  an  incident  of  any  daily 
meal  would  attract  no  notice  whatever.  Jesus  handed  to  the  traitor 
Apostle  a  "sop  "  of  this  kind,  and  this,  as  He  told  St.  John,  was  the 
sign  which  should  indicate  to  him,  and  possibly  through  him  to  St. 
Peter,  which  was  the  guilty  member  of  the  little  band.  And  then  He 
added  aloud,  in  words  which  can  have  but  one  significance,  in  words 
the  most  awful  and  crushing  that  ever  passed  His  lips,  "  The  Son  of 
Man  goeth  indeed,  as  it  is  written  of  Him :  but  woe  unto  that  man  by 
whom  the  Son  of  Man  is  betrayed !  It  were  good  for  that  man  if  he 
had  not  been  born!"  "Words,"  it  has  been  well  said,  "of  immea- 
surable ruin,  words  of  immeasurable  woe  " — and  the  more  terrible 
because  uttered  by  the  lips  of  immeasurable  Love  :  words  capable,  if 
any  were  capable,  of  revealing  to  the  lost  soul  of  the  traitor  all  the 
black  gulf  of  horror  that  was  yawning  before  his  feet.  He  must  have 
known  something  of  what  had  passed  ;  he  may  well  have  overheard 
some  fragment  of  the  conversation,  or  at  least  have  had  a  dim  con- 
sciousness that  in  some  way  it  referred  to  him.  He  may  even  have 


380  THE  LIFE   OP  CHRIST. 

been  aware  that  when  his  hand  met  the  hand  of  Jesus  over  the  dish 
there  was  some  meaning  in  the  action.     When  the  others  were  ques- 
tioning among  themselves  "  which  was  the  traitor  ?  "  he  had  remained 
silent  in  the  defiant  hardness  of  contempt  or  the  sullen  gloom  of  guilt ; 
but  now — stung,  it  may  be,  by  some  sense  of  the  shuddering  horror 
with   which   the    mere    possibility   of    his   guilt   was    regarded — he 
nerved  himself  for    the    shameful   and  shameless   question.      After 
all  the  rest  had  sunk  into  silence,  there  grated  upon  the  Saviour's 
ear  that  hoarse  untimely  whisper,  in  all  the  bitterness  of  its  defiant 
mockery — not  asking,  as  the  rest  had   asked,  in  loving  reverence, 
"Lord,  is  it  I  ?  "  but  with  the  cold  formal  title,  "Rabbi,  is  it  I  ?"  Then 
that  low  unreproachf  ul  answer,  "  Thou  hast  said,"  sealed  his  guilt.  The 
rest  did  not  hear  it ;  it  was  probably  caught  by  Peter  and  John  alone ; 
and  Judas  ate  the  sop  which  Jesus  had  given  him,  and  after  the 
sop  Satan  entered  into  him.      As  all  the  winds,  on  some  night  of 
storm,  riot  and  howl  through  the  rent  walls  of  some  desecrated  shrine, 
so  through  the  ruined  life  of  Judas  envy  and  avarice,  and  hatred  and 
ingratitude,  were  rushing  all  at  once.     In  that  bewildering  chaos  of  a 
soul  spotted  with  mortal  guilt,  the  Satanic  had  triumphed  over  the 
human ;  in  that  dark  heart  earth  and  hell  were  thenceforth  at  one ;  in 
that  lost  soul  sin  had  conceived  and  brought  forth  death.     "  What 
thou  art  doing,  do  more  quickly,"  said  Jesus  to  him  aloud.     He  knew 
what  the  words  implied,  he  knew  that  they  meant,  "  Thy  fell  purpose 
is  matured,  carry  it  out  with  no  more  of  these  futile  hypocrisies  and 
meaningless   delays."      Judas  rose  from  the  feast.      The  innocent- 
hearted  Apostles  thought  that  Jesus  had  bidden  him  go  out  and  make 
purchases  for  to-morrow's  Passover,  or   give   something  out  of  the 
common  store  which  should  enable  the  poor  to  buy  their  Paschal 
lamb.     And  so  from  the  lighted  room,  from  the  holy  banquet,  from 
the  blessed  company,  from  the  presence  of  his  Lord,  he  went  imme- 
diately out,  and — as  the  beloved  disciple  adds,  with  a  shudder  of 
dread  significance  letting  the  curtain  of  darkness  fall  for  ever  on  that 
appalling  figure — "  and  it  was  night." 

We  cannot  tell  with  any  certainty  whether  this  took  place  before 
or  after  the  institution  of  the  Lord's  Supper — whether  Judas  partook 
or  not  of  those  hallowed  symbols.  Nor  can  we  tell  whether  at  all,  or, 
if  at  all,  to  what  extent,  our  Lord  conformed  the  minor  details  of  His 
last  supper  to  the  half-joyous,  half-mournful  customs  of  the  Paschal 
feast;  nor,  again,  can  we  tell  how  far  the  customs  of  the  Passover  in 
that  day  resembled  those  detailed  to  us  in  the  Rabbinic  writings. 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  381 

Nothing  could  have  been  simpler  than  the  ancient  method  of  their 
commemorating  their  deliverance  from  Egypt  and  from  the  destroying 
angel.  The  central  custom  of  the  feast  was  the  hasty  eating  of  the 
Paschal  lamb,  with  unleavened  bread  and  bitter  herbs,  in  a  standing 
attitude,  with  loins  girt  and  shoes  upon  the  feet,  as  they  had  eaten 
hastily  on  the  night  of  their  deliverance.  In  this  way  the  Passover 
is  still  yearly  eaten  by  the  Samaritans  at  the  summit  of  Gerizim,  and 
there  to  this  day  they  will  hand  to  the  stranger  the  little  olive-shaped 
morsel  of  unleavened  bread,  enclosing  a  green  fragment  of  wild  endive 
or  some  other  bitter  herb,  which  may  perhaps  resemble,  except  that  it 
is  not  dipped  in  the  dish,  the  very  ijratpiov  which  Judas  received  at 
the  hands  of  Christ.  But  even  if  the  Last  Supper  was  a  Passover, 
wo  are  told  that  the  Jews  had  long  ceased  to  eat  it  standing,  or  to 
observe  the  rule  which  forbade  any  guest  to  leave  the  house  till 
morning.  They  made,  in  fact,  many  radical  distinctions  between  the 
Egyptian  (ansn  ITOD)  and  the  permanent  Passover  (nrvn  TOD)  which 
was  subsequently  observed.  The  latter  meal  began  by  filling  each 
guest  a  cup  of  wine,  over  which  the  head  of  the  family  pronounced 
a  benediction.  After  this  the  hands  were  washed  in  a  bason  of 
water,  and  a  table  was  brought  in,  on  which  were  placed  the 
bitter  herbs,  the  unleavened  bread,  the  charoseth  (a  dish  made  of 
dates,  raisins,  and  vinegar),  the  Paschal  lamb,  and  the  flesh  of  the 
chagigah.  The  father  dipped  a  piece  of  herb  in  the  charoseth,  ate 
it,  with  a  benediction,  and  distributed  a  similar  morsel  to  all. 
A  second  cup  of  wine  was  then  poured  out ;  the  youngest  present 
inquired  the  meaning  of  the  Paschal  night  ;  the  father  replied 
with  a  full  account  of  the  observance;  the  first  part  of  the  Hallel 
(Ps.  cvii. — cxiv.)  was  then  sung,  a  blessing  repeated,  a  third  cup 
of  wine  was  drunk,  grace  was  said,  a  fourth  cup  poured  out,  the 
rest  of  the  Hallel  (Ps.  cxv. — cxviii.)  sung,  and  the  ceremony  ended  by 
the  blessing  of  the  song.  Some,  no  doubt,  of  the  facts  mentioned  at 
the  Last  Supper  may  be  brought  into  comparison  with  parts  of  this 
ceremony.  It  appears,  for  instance,  that  the  supper  began  with  a 
benediction,  and  the  passing  of  a  cup  of  wine,  which  Jesus  bade  them 
divide  among  themselves,  saying  that  he  would  not  drink  of  the  fruit 
of  the  vine  until  the  kingdom  of  God  should  come.  The  other  cup — 
passed  round  after  supper — has  been  identified  by  some  with  the  third 
cup,  the  Co8  ha-berdchah  or  "  cup  of  blessing  "  of  the  Jewish  cere- 
monial (1  Cor.  x.  16);  and  the  hymn  which  was  sung  before  the 
departure  of  the  little  company  to  Gethsemane  has,  with  much 


382  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

probability,    been    supposed   to    be    the    second  part  of    the   great 
Hallel. 

The  relation  of  these  incidents  of  the  meal  to  the  various  Paschal 
observances  which  we  have  detailed  is,  however,  doubtful.  What  is 
not  doubtful,  and  what  has  the  deepest  interest  for  all  Christians,  is 
the  establishment  at  this  last  supper  of  the  Sacrament  of  the 
Eucharist.  Of  this  we  have  no  fewer  than  four  accounts — the  briei 
description  of  St.  Paul  agreeing  in  almost  verbal  exactness  with  those 
of  the  Synoptists.  In  each  account  we  clearly  recognise  the  main 
facts  which  St.  Paul  expressly  tells  us  that  "  he  had  received  of  the 
Lord " — viz.,  "  that  the  Lord  Jesus,  on  the  same  night  in  which  He 
was  betrayed,  took  bread ;  and  when  He  had  given  thanks,  He  brake 
it,  and  said,  Take,  eat ;  this  is  my  body  which  is  broken  for  you  ;  this 
do  in  remembrance  of  me.  After  the  same  manner  also  He  took  the 
cup  when  He  had  supped,  saying,  This  cup  is  the  New  Testament  in 
my  blood;  this  do  ye,  as  oft  as  ye  drink  it,  in  remembrance  of  me" 
(1  Cor.  xi.  23 — 25).  Never  since  that  memorable  evening  has  the 
Church  ceased  to  observe  the  commandment  of  her  Lord  ;  ever  since 
that  day,  from  age  to  age,  has  this  blessed  and  holy  Sacrament  been  a 
memorial  of  the  death  of  Christ,  and  a  strengthening  and  refreshing 
of  the  soul  by  the  body  and  blood,  as  the  body  is  refreshed  and 
strengthened  by  the  bread  and  wine. 


CHAPTER     LVI. 

THE   LAST  DISCOURSE. 

No  sooner  had  Judas  left  the  room,  than,  as  though  they  had  been 
relieved  of  some  ghastly  incubus,  the  spirits  of  the  little  company 
revived.  The  presence  of  that  haunted  soul  lay  with  a  weight  of 
horror  on  the  heart  of  his  Master,  and  no  sooner  had  he  departed  than 
the  sadness  of  the  feast  seems  to  have  been  sensibly  relieved.  The 
solemn  exultation  which  dilated  the  soul  of  their  Lord — that  joy  like 
the  sense  of  a  boundless  sunlight  behind  the  earth-born  mists — com- 
municated itself  to  the  spirits  of  His  followers.  The  dull  clouda 
caught  the  sunset  colouring.  In  sweet  and  tender  communion,  per- 


THE   LIFE   OF   CflKlST.  388 

haps  two  "hours  glided  away  at  that  quiet'  banquet.  Now  it  was  that, 
conscious  of  the  impending  separation,  and  fixed  unalterably  in  His 
sublime  resolve,  He  opened  His  heart  to  the  little  band  of  those  who 
loved  Him,  and  spoke  among  them  those  farewell  discourses  preserved 
for  us  by  St.  John  alone,  so  "rarely  mixed, .of  sadness  and  joys,  and 
studded  with  mysteries  as  with  emeralds."  "Now,"  He  said,  as 
though  with  a  sigh  of  relief,  "  now  is  the  Son  of  Man  glorified,  and 
God  is  glorified  in  Him."  The  hour  of  that  glorification — the  glorifi- 
cation which  was  to  be  won  through  the  path  of  h&mility  and  agony 
— was  at  hand.  The  time  which,  remained  for  Him  t'o  be  with  them 
was  short ;  as  He  had  said  to  the  Jews,  so  now  He  said  to  tbem,  that 
whither  He  was  going  they  could  not  come.  And  in  telling  them  this, 
for  the  first  and  last  time,  He  calls  them  "little  children."  In  that 
company  were  Peter  and  John,  men  whose  words  and  deeds  should 
thenceforth  influence  the  whole  world  of  man  until  the  end — men 
who  should  become  the  patron  saints  of  nations — in  whose  honour 
cathedrals  should  be  built,  and  from  whom  cities  should  be  named ; 
but  their  greatness  was  but  a  dim  faint  reflection  from  His  risen  glory, 
and  a  gleam  caught  from  that  spirit  which  He  would  send.  Apart 
from  Him  they  were  nothing,  and  less  than  nothing — ignorant  Galilsean 
fishermen,  unknown  and  unheard  of  beyond  their  native  village — 
having  no  intellect  and  no  knowledge  save  that  He  had  thus  regarded 
them  as  His  "little  children."  And  though  they  could  not  follow 
Him  whither  He  went,  yet  He  did  not  say  to  them,  as  He  had  said 
to  the  Jews  (John  vii.  34 ;  viii.  21),  that  they  should  seek  Him  and 
not  find  Him.  Nay,  more,  He  gave  them  a  new  commandment, 
by  which,  walking  in  His  steps,  and  being  known  by  all  men  as 
His  disciples,  they  should  find  Him  soon.  That  new  commandment 
was  that  they  should  love  one  another.  In  one  sense,  indeed,  it 
was  not  new.  Even  in  the  law  of  Moses  (Lev.  xix.  18),  not  only 
had  there  been  room  for  the  precept,  "  Thou  shalt  love  thy  neigh- 
bour as  thyself,"  but  that  precept  had  even  been  regarded  by 
wise  Jewish  teachers  as  cardinal  and  inclusive — as  "  the  royal  law 
according  to  the  Scripture,"  as  "the  message  from  the  beginning" 
(James  ii.  8;  1  John  iii.  11).  And  yet,  as  St.  John  points  out 
in  his  Epistle,  though  in  one  sense  old,  it  was,  in  another,  wholly 
new — new  in  the  new  prominence  given  to  it — new  in  the  new 
motives  by  which  it  was  enforced — new  because  of  the  new  example 
by  which  it  was  recommended — new  from  the  new  influence  which  it 
was  henceforth  destined  to  exercise.  It  was  Love,  as  the  test  and 


384  THE    CIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

condition  of  discipleship,  Love  as  greater  than  even  Faith  and  Hope, 
Love  as  the  fulfilling  of  the  Law. 

At  this  point  St.  Peter  interposed  a  question.  Before  Jesus  entered 
on  a  new  topic,  he  wished;  for  an  explanation  of  something  which  he 
had  not  understood.  Why  was  this  farewell  aspect  about  the  Lord's 
discourse  ?  "  Lord,  whither  goest  thou  ?  " 

"  Whither  I  go  thou  canst  not  follow  me  now,  but  thou  shalt  follow 
me  afterwards." 

Peter  now  understood  that  death  was  meant,  but  why  could  he  not 
also  die  ?  was  he  not  as  ready  as  Thomas  to  say  (John  xi.  16),  "  Let 
us  also  go  that  we  may  die  with  Him  ?  "  "  Lord,  why  cannot  I  follow 
thce  now  ?  I  will  lay  down  my  life  for  thy  sake." 

Why  ?  Our  Lord  might  have  answered,  Because  the  heart  is  de- 
ceitful above  all  things ;  because  thy  want  of  deep  humility  deceives 
thee  ;  because  it  is  hidden,  even  from  thyself,  how  much  there  still  is 
of  cowardice  and  self-seeking  in  thy  motives.  But  He  would  not  deal 
thus  with  the  noble-hearted  but  weak  and  impetuous  Apostle,  whose 
love  was  perfectly  sincere,  though  it  did  not  stand  the  test.  He  spares 
him  all  reproach;  only  very  gently  He  repeats  the  question,  "Wilt 
thou  lay  down  thy  life  for  my  sake  ?  Verily,  verily,  I  say  unto  thee, 
The  cock  shall  not  crow  till  thou  hast  denied  me  thrice ! "  Already  it 
was  night ;  ere  the  dawn  of  that  fatal  morning  shuddered  in  the 
eastern  sky — before  the  cock  crow,  uttered  in  the  deep  darkness, 
prophesied  that  the  dawn  was  near — Jesus  would  have  begun  to  lay 
down  Hia  life  for  Peter  and  for  all  who  sin ;  but  already  by  that  time 
Peter,  unmindful  even  of  this  warning,  should  have  thrice  repudiated 
his  Lord  and  Saviour,  thrice  have  rejected  as  a  calumny  and  an  insult 
the  mere  imputation  that  he  even  knew  Him.  All  that  Jesus  could 
do  to  save  him  from  the  agony  of  this  moral  humiliation — by  ad- 
monition, by  tenderness,  by  prayer  to  His  Heavenly  Father — He  had 
done.  He  had  prayed  for  him  that  his  faith  might  not  finally  fail. 
Satan  indeed  had  obtained  permission  to  sift  them  all  as  wheat,  and  in 
spite  of  all  his  self-confidence,  in  spite  of  all  his  protested  devotion,  in 
spite  of  all  his  imaginary  sincerity,  he  should  be  but  as  the  chaff.  It 
is  remarkable  that  in  the  parallel  passage  of  St.  Luke  occurs  the  only 
instance  recorded  in  the  Gospel  of  our  Lord  having  addressed  Simon  by 
that  name  of  Peter  which  he  had  Himself  bestowed.  It  is  as  though  Ho 
meant  to  remind  the  Man  of  Rock  that  his  strength  lay,  not  in  himself, 
but  in  that  good  confession  which  he  once  had  uttered.  And  yet  Christ 
held  out  to  him  a  gracious  hope.  He  should  repent  and  return  to  the 


THE    LIFE    OF  CHEIST.  385 

Lord  whom  ho  should  deny,  and,  when  that  day  should  come,  Jesus  bade 
him  show  that  truest  and  most  acceptable  proof  of  penitence — the 
strengthening  of  others.  And  if  his  fall  gave  only  too  terrible  a  signi- 
ficance to  his  Saviour's  warnings,  yet  his  repentance  nobly  fulfilled 
those  consolatory  phophecies ;  and  it  is  most  interesting  to  find  that 
the  very  word  which  Jesus  had  used  to  him  recurs  in  his  Epistle  in  a 
connection  which  shows  how  deeply  it  had  sunk  into  his  soul. 

But  Jesus  wished  His  Apostles  to  feel  that  the  time  was  come 
when  all  was  to  be  very  different  from  the  old  spring-tide  of  their 
happy  mission  days  in  Galilee.  Then  He  had  sent  them  forth  without 
purse  or  scrip  or  sandals,  and  yet  they  had  lacked  nothing.  But  the 
purse  and  the  scrip  were  needful  now — even  the  sword  might  become 
a  fatal  necessity — and  therefore  "  he  that  hath  no  sword  let  him  sell 
his  garment  and  buy  one."  The  very  tone  of  the  expression  showed 
that  it  was  not  to  be  taken  in  strict  literalness.  It  was  our  Lord's 
custom — because  His  words,  which  were  spoken  for  all  time,  were 
intended  to  be  fixed  as  goads  and  as  nails  in  a  sure  place — to  clothe 
His  moral  teachings  in  the  form  of  vivid  metaphor  and  searching 
paradox.  It  was  His  object  now  to  warn  them  of  a  changed  con- 
dition, in  which  they  must  expect  hatred,  neglect,  opposition,  and  in 
which  even  self-defence  might  become  a  paramount  duty ;  but,  as 
though  to  warn  them  clearly  that  He  did  not  mean  any  immediate 
effort — as  though  beforehand  to  discourage  any  blow  struck  in  defence 
of  that  life  which  He  willingly  resigned — He  added  that  the  end  was 
near,  and  that  in  accordance  with  olden  prophecy  He  should  be  num- 
bered with  the  transgressors.  But,  as  usual,  the  Apostles  carelessly 
and  ignorantly  mistook  His  words,  seeing  in  them  no  spiritual  lesson, 
but  only  the  barest  and  baldest  literal  meaning.  "  Lord,  behold  here 
ire  two  swords,"  was  their  almost  childish  comment  on  His  words. 
Two  swords  ! — as  though  that  were  enough  to  defend  from  physical 
violence  His  sacred  life !  as  though  that  were  an  adequate  provision 
for  Him  who,  at  a  word,  might  have  commanded  more  than  twelve 
legions  of  angels !  as  though  such  feeble  might,  wielded  by  such  feeble 
hands,  could  save  Him  from  the  banded  hate  of  a  nation  of  His 
enemies  !  "  It  is  enough,"  He  sadly  said.  It  was  not  needful  to 
pursue  the  subject ;  the  subsequent  lesson  in  Gethsemane  would 
uuteach  them  their  weak  misapprehensions  of  His  words.  He  dropped 
the  subject,  and  waiving  aside  their  proffered  swords,  proceeded  to 
that  tenderer  task  of  consolation,  about  which  He  had  so  many  things 
to  say. 

2  c 


386  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

He  bade  them  not  be  troubled ;  they  believed,  and  their  faith 
should  find  its  fruition.  He  was  but  leaving  them  to  prepare  for 
them  a  home  in  the  many  mansions  of  His  Father's  house.  They 
knew  whither  He  was  going,  and  they  knew  the  way. 

"  Lord,  we  know  not  whither  thou  goest,  and  how  can  we  know 
the  way  ?  "  is  the  perplexed  answer  of  the  melancholy  Thomas. 

"lam  the  Way,  the  Truth,  and  the  Life,"  answered  Jesus ;  "no 
man  cometh  unto  the  Father  but  by  me.  If  ye  had  known  me,  ye 
should  have  known  my  Father  also ;  and  from  henceforth  ye  know 
Him,  and  have  seen  Him." 

Again  came  one  of  those  naive  interruptions — so  faithfully  and 
vividly  recorded  by  the  Evangelist — which  yet  reveal  such  a  depth  of 
incapacity  to  understand,  so  profound  a  spiritual  ignorance  after  so 
long  a  course  of  divine  training.  And  we  may  well  be  thankful  that  the 
simplicity  and  ignorance  of  these  Apostles  is  thus  frankly  and  humbly 
recorded;  for  nothing  can  more  powerfully  tend  to  prove  the  utter 
change  which  must  have  passed  over  their  spirits,  for  men  so  timid, 
so  carnal,  so  Judaic,  so  unenlightened,  could  be  transformed  into  the 
Apostles  whose  worth  we  know,  and  who — inspired  by  the  facts  which 
they  had  seen,  and  by  the  Holy  Spirit  who  gave  them  wisdom  and 
utterance — became,  before  their  short  lives  were  ended  by  violence, 
the  mightiest  teachers  of  the  world. 

"Lord,  show  us  the  Father,"  said  Philip  of  Bethsaida,  "and  it 
sufficeth  us ! " 

Show  us  the  Father !  what  then  did  Philip  expect  ?  Some  earth- 
shaking-epiphany  ?  Some  blinding  splendour  in  the  heavens  ?  Had 
he  not  yet  learnt  that  He  who  is  invisible  cannot  be  seen  by  mortal 
eyes ;  that  the  finite  cannot  attain  to  the  vision  of  the  Infinite ;  that 
they  who  would  see  God  must  see  no  manner  of  similitudes ;  that  His 
awful  silence  can  only  be  broken  to  us  through  the  medium  of  human 
voices,  His  being  only  comprehended  by  means  of  the  things  that  He 
hath  made  ?  And  had  he  wholly  failed  to  discover  that  for  these  three 
years  he  had  been  walking  with  God  ?  that  neither  he,  nor  any  other 
mortal  man  could  ever  know  more  of  God  in  this  world  than  that  which 
should  be  revealed  of  Him  by  "  the  only-begotten  Son  which  is  in  the 
bosom  of  the  Father  ?  " 

Again  there  was  no  touch  of  anger,  only  a  slight  accent  of  pained 
surprise  in  the  quiet  answer,  "  Have  I  been  so  long  with  you,  and  yet 
hast  thou  not  known  me,  Philip  ?  He  that  hath  seen  me  hath  seen  the 
Father,  and  how  sayest  thou  then,  Show  us  the  Father  ?  " 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  387 

And  then  appealing  to  His  words  and  to  His  works  as  only  possible 
by  the  indwelling  of  His  Father,  He  proceeded  to  unfold  to  them  the 
coming  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  how  that  Comforter  dwelling  in  them 
should  make  them  one  with  the  Father  and  with  Him. 

But  at  this  point  Judas  Lebbaeus  had  a  difficulty.  He  had  not 
understood  that  the  eye  can  only  see  that  which  it  possesses  the 
inherent  power  of  seeing.  He  could  not  grasp  the  fact  that  God  can 
become  visible  to  those  alone  the  eyes  of  whose  understanding  are 
open  so  that  they  can  discern  spiritual  things.  "  Lord,  how  is  it," 
he  asked,  "that  thou  wilt  manifest  thyself  unto  us,  and  not  to  the 
world  ?  " 

The  difficulty  was  exactly  of  the  same  kind  as  Philip's  had  been — 
the  total  inability  to  distinguish  between  a  physical  and  a  spiritual 
manifestation ;  and  without  formally  removing  it,  Jesus  gave  them 
all,  once  more,  the  true  clue  to  the  comprehension  of  His  words — that 
God  lives  with  them  that  love  Him,  and  that  the  proof  of  love  is 
obedience.  For  all  further  teaching  He  referred  them  to  the  Com- 
forter whom  He  was  about  to  send,  who  should  bring  all  things  to 
their  remembrance.  And  now  He  breathes  upon  them  His  blessing 
of  peace,  meaning  to  add  but  little  more,  because  His  conflict  with  the 
prince  of  this  world  should  now  begin. 

At  this  point  of  the  discourse  there  was  a  movement  among  the 
little  company.  "Arise,"  said  Jesus,  "let  us  go  hence." 

They  rose  from  the  table,  and  united  their  voices  in  a  hymn  which 
may  well  have  been  a  portion  of  the  great  Hallel,  and  not  improb- 
ably the  116th,  117th,  and  118th  Psalms.  What  an  imperishable 
interest  do  these  Psalms  derive  from  such  an  association,  and  how  full 
of  meaning  must  many  of  the  verses  have  been  to  some  of  them  ! 
With  what  intensity  of  feeling  must  they  have  joined  in  singing  such 
words  as  these — "  The  sorrows  of  death  compassed  me,  the'  pains  of 
hell  gat  hold  upon  me ;  I  found  trouble  and  sorrow.  Then  called  I 
upon  the  name  of  the  Lord ;  0  Lord,  I  beseech  thee,  deliver  my  soul ; " 
or  again,  "What  shall  I  render  unto  the  Lord  for  all  His  benefits 
toward  me  ?  I  will  take  the  cup  of  salvation,  and  call  upon  the  name 
of  the  Lord ;"  or  once  again,  "  Thou  hast  thrust  sore  at  me  that  I 
might  fall :  but  the  Lord  helped  me.  The  Lord  is  my  strength  and 
my  song,  and  is  become  my  salvation.  The  stone  which  the  builders 
refused  is  become  the  head-stone  in  the  corner.  This  is  the  Lord's 
doing ;  it  ia  marvellous  in  our  eyes." 

Before  they  started  for  their  moonlight  walk  to  the  Garden  of 

2  c  2 


388  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

Gethsemane,  perhaps  while  yet  they  stood  around  their  Lord  when  the 
Hallel  was  over,  He  once  more  spoke  to  them.  First  He  told  them  of 
the  need  of  closest  union  with  Him,  if  they  would  bring  forth  fruit, 
and  be  saved  from  destruction.  He  clothed  this  lesson  in  the  allegory 
of  "  the  Vine  and  the  Branches."  There  is  no  need  to  find  any  imme- 
diate circumstance  which  suggested  the  metaphor,  beyond  the  "  fruit 
of  the  vine "  of  which  they  had  been  partaking :  but  if  any  were 
required,  we  might  suppose  that,  as  He  looked  out  into  the  night,  He 
saw  the  moonlight  silvering  the  leaves  of  a  vine  which  clustered  round 
the  latticed  window,  or  falling  on  the  colossal  golden  vine  which 
wreathed  one  of  the  Temple  gates.  But  after  impressing  this  truth 
in  the  vivid  form  of  parable,  He  showed  them  how  deep  a  source  of 
joy  it  would  be  to  them  in  the  persecutions  which  awaited  them  from 
an  angry  world ;  and  then  in  fuller,  plainer,  deeper  language  than 
He  had  ever  used  before,  He  told  them,  that,  in  spite  of  all  the  anguish 
with  which  they  contemplated  the  coming  separation  from  Him,  it 
was  actually  better  for  them  that  His  personal  presence  should  be 
withdrawn  in  order  that  His  spiritual  presence  might  be  yet  nearer 
to  them  than  it  ever  had  been  before.  This  would  be  effected  by  the 
coming  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  when  He  who  was  now  with  them  should 
be  ever  in  them.  The  mission  of  that  Comforter  should  be  to  convince 
the  world  of  sin,  of  righteousness,  and  of  judgment ;  and  He  should 
guide  them  into  all  truth,  and  show  them  things  to  come.  "  Ho 
shall  glorify  me ;  for  He  shall  receive  of  mine,  and  show  it  unto 
you."  And  now  He  was  going  to  His  Father;  a  little  while,  and 
they  should  not  see  Him ;  and  again  a  little  while,  and  they  should 
see  Him. 

The  uncertainty  as  to  what  He  meant  carried  the  disciples  once 
more  to  questions  among  themselves  during  one  of  the  solemn  pauses 
of  His  discourse.  They  would  gladly  have  asked  Him,  but  a  deep  awe 
was  upon  their  spirits,  and  they  did  not  dare.  Already  they  had 
several  times  broken  the  current  of  His  thoughts  by  questions  which, 
though  He  did  not  reprove  them,  had  evidently  grieved  Him  by  their 
emptiness,  and  by  the  misapprehension  which  they  showed  of  all  that 
He  sought  to  impress  upon  them.  So  their  whispered  questioning 
died  away  into  silence,  but  their  Master  kindly  came  to  their  relief. 
This,  He  told  them,  was  to  be  their  brief  hour  of  anguish,  but  it  was 
to  be  followed  by  a  joy  of  which  man  could  not  rob  them ;  and  to  tkat 
joy  there  need  be  no  limit,  for  whatever  might  be  their  need  they  had 
but  to  ask  the  Father,  and  it  should  be  fulfilled.  To  that  Father  who 


THE    LIFE    OF    CHRIST.  389 

Himself  loved  them,  for  their  belief  in  Him — to  that  Father,  from 
whom  He  came,  He  was  now  about  to  return. 

The  disciples  were  deeply  grateful  for  these  plain  and  most  con- 
soling words.  Once  more  they  were  unanimous  in  expressing  their 
belief  that  He  came  forth  from  God.  But  Jesus  sadly  checked  their 
enthusiasm.  His  words  had  been  meant  to  give  them  peace  in  the 
present,  and  courage  and  hope  for  the  future  ;  yet  He  knew  and  told 
them  that,  in  spite  of  all  that  they  said,  the  hour  was  now  close  at 
hand  when  they  should  all  be  scattered  in  selfish  terror,  and  leave  Him 
alone — yet  not  alone,  because  the  Father  was  with  Him. 

And  after  these  words  He  lifted  up  His  eyes  to  heaven,  and 
uttered  His  great  High-Priestly  prayer :  first,  that  His  Father  would 
invest  His  voluntary  humanity  with  the  eternal  glory  of  which  He 
had  emptied  Himself  when  He  took  the  form  of  a  servant ;  next,  that 
He  would  keep  through  His  own  name  these  His  loved  ones  who  had 
walked  with  Him  in  the  world  ;  and  then  that  He  would  sanctify  and 
make  perfect  not  these  alone,  but  all  the  myriads,  all  the  long  genera- 
tions, which  should  hereafter  believe  through  their  word. 

And  when  the  tones  of  this  divine  prayer  were  hushed,  they  left 
the  guest-chamber  and  stepped  into  the  moonlit  silence  of  the  Oriental 
night. 


CHAPTER    LVH. 

GETHSEMANE — THE  AGONY  AND  THE  ARREST. 

THEIR  way  led  them  through  one  of  the  city  gates — probably  that 
which  then  corresponded  to  the  present  gate  of  St.  Stephen — down 
the  steep  sides  of  the  ravine,  across  the  wady  of  the  Kidron,  which 
lay  a  hundred  feet  below,  and  up  the  green  and  quiet  slope  beyond  it. 
To  one  who  has  visited  the  scene  at  that  very  season  of  the  year  and 
at  that  very  hour  of  the  night — who  has  felt  the  solemn  hush  of  the 
silence  even  at  this  short  distance  from  the  city  wall — who  has  seen 
the  deep  shadows  flung  by  the  great  boles  of  the  ancient  olive-trees, 
and  the  chequering  of  light  that  falls  on  the  sward  through  their 
moonlight-silvered  leaves,  it  is  more  easy  to  realise  the  awe  which 


390  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

crept  over  those  few  Galilaeans,  as  in  almost  unbroken  silence,  with 
something  perhaps  of  secrecy,  and  with  a  weight  of  mysterious  dread 
brooding  over  their  spirits,  they  followed  Him,  who  with  bowed  head 
and  sorrowing  heart  walked  before  them  to  His  willing  doom. 

We  are  told  but  of  one  incident  in  that  last  and  memorable  walk 
through  the  midnight  to  the  familiar  Garden  of  Gethsemane.  It  was 
a  last  warning  to  the  disciples  in  general,  to  St.  Peter  in  particular. 
It  may  be  that  the  dimness,  the  silence,  the  desertion  of  their  position, 
the  dull  echo  of  their  footsteps,  the  stealthy  aspect  which  their  move- 
ments wore,  the  agonising  sense  that  treachery  was  even  now  at  work, 
was  beginning  already  to  produce  an  icy  chill  of  cowardice  in  their 
hearts ;  sadly  did  Jesus  turn  and  say  to  them  that  on  that  very  night 
they  should  all  be  offended  in  Him — all  find  their  connection  with 
Him  a  stumbling-block  in  their  path — and  the  old  prophecy  should 
be  fulfilled,  "  I  will  smite  the  shepherd,  and  the  sheep  shall  be  scattered 
abroad."  And  yet,  in  spite  of  all,  as  a  shepherd  would  he  go  before 
them,  leading  the  way  to  Galilee  ?  They  all  repudiated  the  possi- 
bility of  such  an  abandonment  of  their  Lord,  and  Peter,  touched 
already  by  this  apparent  distrust  of  His  stability,  haunted  perhaps  by 
some  dread  lest  Jesus  felt  any  doubt  of  him,  was  loudest  and  most 
emphatic  in  his  denial.  Even  if  all  should  be  offended,  yet  never 
would  he  be  offended.  Was  it  a  secret  misgiving  in  his  own  heart 
which  made  his  asseveration  so  prominent  and  so  strong  ?  Not  even 
the  repetition  of  the  former  warning,  that,  ere  the  cock  should  crow, 
he  would  thrice  have  denied  his  Lord,  could  shake  him  from  his 
positive  assertion  that  even  the  necessity  of  death  itself  should  never 
drive  him  to  such  a  sin.  And  Jesus  only  listened  in  mournful  silence 
to  vows  which  should  so  soon  be  scattered  into  air. 

So  they  came  to  Gethsemane,  which  is  about  half  a  mile  from  the 
city  walls.  It  was  a  garden  or  orchard  marked  probably  by  some 
slight  enclosure ;  and  as  it  had  been  a  place  of  frequent  resort  for 
Jesus  and  His  followers,  we  may  assume  that  it  belonged  to  some 
friendly  owner.  The  name  Gethsemane  means  "the  oil-press,"  and 
doubtless  it  was  so  called  from  a  press  to  crush  the  olives  yielded  by 
the  countless  trees  from  which  the  hill  derives  its  designation.  Any 
one  who  has  rested  at  noonday  in  the  gardens  of  En-gannim  or 
Nazareth  in  spring,  and  can  recall  the  pleasant  shade  yielded  by  the 
interlaced  branches  of  olive  and  pomegranate,  and  fig  and  myrtle, 
may  easily  imagine  what  kind  of  spot  it  was.  The  traditional  site, 
venerable  and  beautiful  as  it  is  from  the  age  and  size  of  the  grey 


THE   LIFE   OF  CUEIST.  391 

gnarled  olive-trees,  of  which  one  is  still  known  as  the  Tree  of  the 
Agony,  is,  perhaps,  too  public — being,  as  it  always  mnst  have  been, 
at  the  angle  formed  by  the  two  paths  which  lead  over  the  summit  and 
shoulder  of  Olivet — to  be  regarded  as  the  actual  spot.  It  was  more 
probably  one  of  the  secluded  hollows  at  no  great  distance  from  it 
which  witnessed  that  scene  of  awful  and  pathetic  mystery.  But 
although  the  exact  spot  cannot  be  determined  with  certainty,  the 
general  position  of  Gethsemane  is  clear,  and  then  as  now  the  chequer- 
ing moonlight,  the  grey  leaves,  the  dark  brown  trunks,  the  soft 
greensward,  the  ravine  with  Olivet  towering  over  it  to  the  eastward 
and  Jerusalem  to  the  west,  must  have  been  the  main  external  features 
of  a  place  which  must  be  regarded  with  undying  interest  while  Time 
shall  be,  as  the  place  where  the  Saviour  of  mankind  entered  alone  into 
the  Valley  of  the  Shadow. 

Jesus  knew  that  the  awful  hoar  of  His  deepest  humiliation  had 
arrived — that  from  this  moment  till  the  utterance  of  that  great  cry 
with  which  He  expired,  nothing  remained  for  Him  on  earth  but  the 
torture  of  physical  pain  and  the  poignancy  of  mental  anguish.  All  that 
the  human  frame  can"  tolerate  of  suffering  was  to  be  heaped  upon  His 
shrinking  body;  every  misery  that  cruel  and  crushing  insult  can  inflict 
was  to  weigh  heavy  on  His  soul ;  and  in  this  torment  of  body  and  agony 
of  soul  even  the  high  and  radiant  serenity  of  His  divine  spirit  was  to 
suffer  a  short  but  terrible  eclipse.  Pain  in  its  acutest  sting,  shame  in  its 
most  overwhelming  brutality,  all  the  burden  of  the  sin  and  mystery  of 
man's  existence  in  its  apostacy  and  fall — this  was  what  He  must  now 
face  in  all  its  most  inexplicable  accumulation.  But  one  thing  remained 
before  the  actual  struggle,  the  veritable  agony,  began.  He  had  to 
brace  His  body,  to  nerve  His  soul,  to  calm  His  spirit  by  prayer  and 
solitude  to  meet  that  hour  in  which  all  that  is  evil  in  the  Power  of 
Evil  should  wreak  its  worst  upon  the  Innocent  and  Holy.  And  Ho 
must  face  that  hour  alone :  no  human  eye  must  witness,  except 
through  the  twilight  and  shadow,  the  depth  of  His  suffering.  Yet  He 
would  have  gladly  shared  their  sympathy ;  it  helped  him  in  this  hour 
of  darkness  to  feel  that  they  were  near,  and  that  those  were  nearest 
who  loved  Him  best.  "  Stay  here,"  he  said  to  the  majority,  "while  I 
go  there  and  pray."  Leaving  them  to  sleep  on  the  damp  grass,  each 
wrapped  in  his  outer  garment,  He  took  with  Him  Peter  and  James 
and  John,  and  went  about  a  stone 's-throw  farther.  It  was  well  that 
Peter  should  face  all  that  was  involved  in  allegiance  to  Christ :  it  was 
well  that  James  and  John  should  know  what  was  that  cup  which  they 


392  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

tad  desired  pre-eminently  to  drink.  But  soon  even  the  society  ol 
these  chosen  and  trusted  oues  was  more  than  He  could  bear.  A  griel 
beyond  utterance,  a  struggle  beyond  endurance,  a  horror  of  greai 
darkness,  a  giddiness  and  stupefaction  of  soul  overmastered  Him,  as 
•with  the  sinking  swoon  of  an  anticipated  death.  It  was  a  tumult  oi 
emotion  which  none  must  see.  "My  soul,"  He  said,  "is  full  oi 
anguish,  even  unto  death.  Stay  here  and  keep  watch."  Reluctantly 
He  tore  Himself  away  from  their  sustaining  tenderness  and  devotion, 
and  retired  yet  farther,  perhaps  out  of  the  moonlight  into  the  shadow. 
And  there,  until  slumber  overpowered  them,  they  were  conscious  of 
how  dreadful  was  that  paroxysm  of  prayer  and  suffering  through 
which  He  passed.  They  saw  Him  sometimes  on  His  knees,  sometimes 
outstretched  in  prostrate  supplication  upon  the  damp  ground ;  they 
heard  snatches  of  the  sounds  of  murmured  anguish  in  which  His 
humanity  pleaded  with  the  divine  will  of  His  Father.  The  actual 
words  might  vary,  but  the  substance  was  the  same  throughout. 
"  Abba,  Father,  all  things  are  possible  unto  Thee  ;  take  away  this  cup 
from  me  ;  nevertheless,  not  what  I  will,  but  what  Thou  wilt." 

And  that  prayer  in  all  its  infinite  reverence  and  awe  was  heard ; 
that  strong  crying  and  those  tears  were  not  rejected.  We  may  not 
intrude  too  closely  into  this  scene.  It  is  shrouded  in  a  halo  and  a 
mystery  into  which  no  footstep  may  penetrate.  We,  as  we  contem- 
plate it,  are  like  those  disciples — our  senses  are  confused,  our  per- 
ceptions are  not  clear.  We  can  but  enter  into  their  amazement 
and  sore  distress.  Half  waking,  half  oppressed  with  an  irresistible 
weight  of  troubled  slumber,  they  only  felt  that  they  were  dim 
witnesses  of  an  unutterable  agony,  far  deeper  than  anything 
which  they  could  fathom,  as  it  far  transcended  all  that,  even 
in  our  purest  moments,  we  can  pretend  to  understand.  The  place 
seems  haunted  by  presences  of  good  and  evil,  struggling  in  mighty 
but  silent  contest  for  the  eternal  victory.  They  see  Him,  before  whom 
the  demons  had  fled  in  howling  terror,  lying  on  His  face  upon  the 
ground.  They  hear  that  voice  wailing  in  murmurs  of  broken  agony, 
which  had  commanded  the  wind  "and  the  sea,  and  they  obeyed  Him. 
The  great  drops  of  anguish  which  drop  from  Him  in  the  deathful 
struggle,  look  to  them  like  heavy  gouts  of  blood.  Under  the  dark 
shadows  of  the  trees,  amid  the  interrupted  moonlight,  it  seems  to  them 
that  there  is  an  angel  with  Him,  who  supports  His  failing  strength, 
who  enables  Him  to  rise  victorious  from  those  first  prayers  with 
nothing  but  the  crimson  traces  of  that  bitter  struggle  upon  His  brow. 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  393 

And  whence  came  all  this  agonised  failing  of  heart,  this  fearful 
amazement,  this  horror  of  great  darkness,  this  passion  which  almost 
brought  Him  down  to  the  grave  before  a  single  pang  had  been  inflicted 
upon  Him — which  forced  from  Him  the  rare  and  intense  phenomenon 
of  a  blood-stained  sweat — which  almost  prostrated  body,  and  soul,  and 
spirit  with  one  final  blow?  Was  it  the  mere  dread  of  death — the 
mere  effort  and  determination  to  face  that  which  He  foreknew  in  all 
its  dreadfulness,  but  from  which,  nevertheless,  His  soul  recoiled? 
There  have  been  those  who  have  dared — I  can  scarcely  write  it  with- 
out shame  and  sorrow — to  speak  very  slightingly  about  Gethsemane  ; 
to  regard  that  awful  scene,  from  the  summit  of  their  ignorant  presump- 
tion, with  an  almost  contemptuous  dislike — to  speak  as  though  Jesus 
had  there  shown  a  cowardly  sensibility.  Thus,  at  the  very  moment 
when  we  should  most  wonder  and  admire,  they 

"  Not  even  from  the  Holy  One  of  Heaven 
Befrain  their  tongues  blasphemous. '' 

And  yet,  if  no  other  motive  influence  them — if  they  merely  regard 
Him  as  a  Prophet  preparing  for  a  cruel  death — if  no  sense  of  decency, 
no  power  of  sympathy,  restrain  them  from  thus  insulting  even  a 
Martyr's  agony  at  the  moment  when  its  pang  -was  most  intense — does 
not  common  fairness,  does  not  the  most  ordinary  historic  criticism, 
show  them  how  cold  and  false,  if  nothing  worse,  must  be  the  miser- 
able insensibility  which  prevents  them  from  seeing  that  it  could  have 
been  no  mere  dread  of  pain,  no  mere  shrinking  from  death,  which  thus 
agitated  to  its  inmost  centre  the  pure  and  innocent  soul  of  the  Son  of 
Man  ?  Could  not  even  a  child  see  how  inconsistent  would  be  such  an 
hypothesis  with  that  heroic  fortitude  which  fifteen  hours  of  subsequent 
sleepless  agony  could  not  disturb — with  the  majestic  silence  before 
priest  and  procurator,  and  king — with  the  endurance  from  which  the 
extreme  of  torture  could  not  wring  one  cry — with  the  calm  and  infinite 
ascendancy  which  overawed  the  hardened  and  worldly  Roman  into  in- 
voluntary respect — with  the  undisturbed  supremacy  of  soul  which 
opened  the  gates  of  Paradise  to  the  repentant  malefactor,  and  breathed 
compassionate  forgiveness  on  the  apostate  priests  ?  The  Son  of  Man 
humiliated  into  prostration  by  the  mere  abject  fear  of  death,  which 
trembling  old  men  and  feeble  maidens,  and  timid  boys — a  Polycarp, 
a  Blandina,  an  Attains — have  yet  braved  without  a  sigh  or  a  shudder, 
solely  through  faith  in  His  name !  Strange  that  He  should  be  thus 


394  THE   LIFE    OF   CHBIST. 

insulted  by  impious  tongues,  who  brought  to  light  that  life  and  im- 
mortality from  whence  came  the 

"  Enendi 

In  ferrum  mens  prona  viris,  animaeque  capacea 
Mortis,  et  ignamm  rediturae  pa-rcere  ritae  ! " 

—(Luc.  Phars.  i.  455.) 

The  meanest  of  idiots,  the  coarsest  of  criminals,  have  advanced  to  the 
scaffold  without  a  tremor  or  a  sob,  and  many  a  brainless  and  brutal 
murderer  has  mounted  the  ladder  with  a  firm  step,  and  looked  round 
upon  a  yelling  mob  with  an  unflinching  countenance.  To  adopt  tha 
commonplace  of  orators,  "  There  is  no  passion  in  the  mind  of  man  so 
weak  but  it  mates  and  masters  the  fear  of  death.  Revenge  triumphs 
over  death ;  love  slights  it ;  honour  aspireth  to  it ;  grief  flieth  to  it ; 
fear  preoccupateth  it.  A  man  would  die,  though  he  were  neither 
valiant  nor  miserable,  only  upon  a  weariness  to  do  the  same  thing 
so  oft  over  and  over.  It  is  no  less  worthy  to  observe  how  little 
alteration  in  good  spirits  the  approaches  of  death  make:  for  they 
appear  to  be  the  same  men  till  the  last  instant."  It  is  as  natural  to 
die  as  to  be  born.  The  Christian  hardly  needs  to  be  told  that  it  was 
no  such  vulgar  fear  which  forced  from  his  Saviour  that  sweat  of  blood. 
No,  it  was  something  infinitely  more  than  this :  infinitely  more  than 
the  highest  stretch  of  our  imagination  can  realise.  It  was  something 
far  deadlier  than  death.  It  was  the  burden  and  the  mystery  of  the 
world's  sin  which  lay  heavy  on  His  heart ;  it  was  the  tasting,  in  the 
divine  humanity  of  a  sinless  life,  the  bitter  cup  which  sin  had  poisoned ; 
it  was  the  bowing  of  Godhead  to  endure  a  stroke  to  which  man's 
apostacy  had  lent  such  frightful  possibilities.  It  was  the  sense,  too, 
of  how  virulent,  how  frightful,  must  have  been  the  force  of  evil  in  the 
Universe  of  God  which  could  render  necessary  so  infinite  a  sacrifice. 
It  was  the  endurance,  by  the  perfectly  guiltless,  of  the  worst  malice 
which  human  hatred  could  devise  ;  it  was  to  experience  in  the  bosom 
of  perfect  innocence  and  perfect  love,  all  that  was  detestable  in  human 
ingratitude,  all  that  was  pestilent  in  human  hypocrisy,  all  that  was 
cruel  in  human  rage.  It  was  to  brave  the  last  triumph  of  Satanic 
spite  and  fury,  uniting  against  His  lonely  head  all  the  flaming  arrows 
of  Jewish  falsity  and  heathen  corruption — the  concentrated  wrath  of 
the  rich  and  respectable,  the  yelling  fuiy  of  the  blind  and  brutal  mob. 
It  was  to  feel  that  His  own,  to  whom  He  came,  loved  darkness  rather 
tbau  light — that  the  race  of  the  chosen  people  could  be  wholly 


THE    LIFE    OF    CHRIST. 


395 


absorbed  in  one  insane  repulsion  against  infinite  goodness  and  parity 
and  love. 

Through  all  this  he  passed  in  that  hour  which,  with  a  recoil  of 
sinless  horror  beyond  our  capacity  to  conceive,  foretasted  a  worse 
bitterness  than  the  worst  bitterness  of  death.  And  after  a  time — 
victorious  indeed,  but  weary  almost  to  fainting,  like  His  ancestor 
Jacob,  with  the  struggle  of  those  supplications — He  came  to  seek 
one  touch  of  human  support  and  human  sympathy  from  the  chosen  of 
the  chosen — His  three  Apostles.  Alas  !  Ho  found  them  sleeping.  It 
was  an  hour  of  fear  and  peril ;  yet  no  certainty  of  danger,  no  love 
for  Jesus,  no  feeling  for  His  unspeakable  dejection,  had  sufficed  to 
hold  their  eyes  waking.  Their  grief,  their  weariness,  their  intense 
excitement,  had  sought  relief  in  heavy  slumber.  Even  Peter,  after  all 
his  impetuous  promises,  lay  in  deep  sleep,  for  his  eyes  were  heavy. 
"Simon,  sleepest  thou?"  was  all  He  said.  As  the  sad  reproachful 
sentence  fell  on  their  ears,  and  startled  them  from  their  slumbers, 
"Were  ye  so  unable,"  He  asked,  "  to  watch  with  me  a  single  hour? 
Watch  and  pray  that  ye  enter  not  into  temptation."  And  then,  not  to 
palliate  their  failure,  but  rather  to  point  out  the  peril  of  it,  "  The 
spirit,"  he  added,  "  is  willing,  but  the  flesh  is  weak." 

Once  more  He  left  them,  and  again,  with  deeper  intensity,  repeated 
the  same  prayer  as  before,  and  in  a  pause  of  His  emotion  came  back  to 
His  disciples.  But  they  had  once  more  fallen  asleep ;  nor,  when  He 
awoke  them,  could  they,  in  their  heaviness  and  confusion,  find  any- 
thing to  say  to  Him.  Well  might  He  have  said,  in  the  words  of 
David,  "  Thy  rebuke  hath  broken  my  heart;  I  am  full  of  heaviness  ;  I 
looked  for  some  to  have  pity  on  me,  but  there  was  no  man,  neither 
found  I  any  to  comfort  me."  (Ps.  Ixix.  20.) 

For  the  third  and  last  time — but  now  with  a  deeper  calm,  and  a 
brighter  serenity  of  that  triumphant  confidence  which  had  breathed 
through  the  High-Priestly  prayer — He  withdrew  to  find  His  only  con- 
solation in  communing  with  God.  And  there  He  found  all  that  He 
needed.  Before  that  hour  was  over  He  was  prepared  for  the  worst 
that  Satan  or  man  could  do.  He  knew  all  that  would  befall  Him ; 
perhaps  He  had  already  caught  sight  of  the  irregular  glimmering  of 
lights  as  His  pursuers  descended  from  the  Temple  precincts.  Yet 
there  was  no  trace  of  agitation  in  His  quiet  words  when,  coming  a 
third  time  and  finding  them  once  more  sleeping,  "  Sleep  on  now,"  He 
said,  "  and  take  your  rest.  It  is  enough.  The  hour  is  come.  Lo  ! 
the  Son  of  Man  is  being  betrayc  d  into  the  hands  of  sinners."  For  all 


396  THE   LIFE   OF  CHEIST. 

the  aid  that  you  can  render,  for  all  the  comfort  your  sympathy  can 
bestow,  sleep  on.  But  all  is  altered  now.  It  is  not  I  who  now  wish 
to  break  these  your  heavy  slumbers.  They  will  be  very  rudely  and 
sternly  broken  by  others.  "  Rise,  then ;  let  us  be  going.  Lo  !  he  that 
betrayeth  me  is  at  hand." 

Yes,  it  was  more  than  time  to  rise,  for  while  saints  had  slumbered 
sinners  had  plotted  and  toiled  in  exaggerated  preparation.  While 
they  slept  in  their  heavy  anguish,  the  traitor  had  been  very  wakeful 
in  his  active  malignity.  More  than  two  hours  had  passed  since  from 
the  lighted  chamber  of  their  happy  communion  he  had  plunged  into 
the  night,  and  those  hours  had  been  very  fully  occupied.  He  had  gone 
to  the  High  Priests  and  Pharisees,  agitating  them  and  hurrying  them 
on  with  his  own  passionate  precipitancy ;  and  partly  perhaps  out  of 
genuine  terror  of  Him  with  whom  he  had  to  deal,  partly  to  enhance  his 
own  importance,  had  got  the  leading  Jews  to  furnish  him  with  a 
motley  band  composed  of  their  own  servants,  of  the  Temple  watch 
with  their  officers,  and  even  with  a  part  at  least  of  the  Roman  garrison 
from  the  Tower  of  Antonia,  under  the  command  of  their  tribune. 
They  were  going  against  One  who  was  deserted  and  defenceless,  yet 
the  soldiers  were  armed  with  swords,  and  even  the  promiscuous  throng- 
had  provided  themselves  with  sticks.  They  were  going  to  seize  One 
who  would-  make  no  attempt  at  flight  or  concealment,  and  the  full 
moon  shed  its  lustre  on  their  unhallowed  expedition;  yet,  lest  He 
should  escape  them  in  some  limestone  grotto,  or  in  the  deep  shade  of 
the  olives,  they  carried  lanterns  and  torches  in  their  hands:  It  is 
evident  that  they  made  their  movements  as  noiseless  and  stealthy  as 
possible ;  but  at  night  a  deep  stillness  hangs  over  an  Oriental  city,  and 
so  large  a  throng  could  not  move  unnoticed.  Already,  as  Jesus  was 
awaking  His  sleepy  disciples,  His  ears  had  caught  in  the  distance  the 
clank  of  swords,  the  tread  of  hurrying  footsteps,  the  ill-suppressed 
tumult  of  an  advancing  crowd.  He  knew  all  that  awaited  Him ;  He 
knew  that  the  quiet  garden  which  He  had  loved,  and  where  He  had 
so  often  held  happy  intercourse  with  His  disciples,  was  familiar  to  the 
traitor.  Those  unwonted  and  hostile  sounds,  that  red  glare  of  lamps 
and  torches  athwart  the  moonlit  interspaces  of  the  olive-yards,  were 
enough  to  show  that  Judas  had  betrayed  the  secret  of  His  retirement, 
and  was  even  now  at  hand. 

And  even  as  Jesus  spoke  the  traitor  himself  appeared.  Overdoing 
his  part — acting  in  the  too-hurried  impetuosity  of  a  crime  so  hideous 
that  he  dared  not  pause  to  think — he  pressed  forward  into  the  enclo- 


THK   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  597 

sure,  and  was  in  front  of  all  the  rest.  "  Comrade,"  said  Jesus  to  him 

as  he  hurried  forward,  "the  crime  for  which  thou  art  come "  The 

sentence  seems  to  have  been  cut  short  by  the  deep  agitation  of  His 
spirit,  nor  did  Judas  return  any  answer,  intent  only  on  giving  to 
his  confederates  his  shameful  preconcerted  signal.  "  He  whom 
I  kiss,"  he  had  said  to  them,  "  the  same  is  He.  Seize  Him  at 
once,  and  lead  Him  away  safely."  And  so,  advancing  to  Jesus 
with  his  usual  cold  title  of  address,  he  exclaimed,  "Rabbi,  Rabbi, 
hail !  "  and  profaned  the  sacred  cheek  of  his  Master  with  a  kiss 
of  overacted  salutation.  "  Judas,"  said  Jesus  to  him,  with  stern  and 
sad  reproach,  "dost  thon  betray  the  Son  of  Man  with  a  kiss?"  These 
words  were  enough,  for  they  simply  revealed  the  man  to  himself,  by 
stating  his  hideous  act  in  all  its  simplicity ;  and  the  method  of  his 
treachery  was  so  unparalleled  in  its  heinousness,  so  needless  and 
spontaneously  wicked,  that  more  words  would  have  been  superfluous. 
With  feelings  that  the  very  devils  might  have  pitied,  the  wretch  slunk 
back  to  the  door  of  the  enclosure,  towards  which  the  rest  of  the  crowd 
were  now  beginning  to  press.  •••  • 

"  Lord,  shall  we  smite  with  the  sword  ?  "  was  the  eager  question 
of  St.  Peter,  and  the  only  other  disciple  provided  with  a  weapon ;  for, 
being  within  the  garden,  the  Apostles  were  still  unaware  of  the 
number  of  the  captors.  Jesus  did  not  at  once  answer  the  question ; 
for  no  sooner  had  He  repelled  the  villainous  falsity  of  Judas  than  He 
Himself  stepped  out  of  the  enclosure  to  face  His  pursuers.  Not 
flying,  not  attempting  to  hide  Himself,  He  stood  there  before  them  in 
the  full  moonlight  in  His  unarmed  and  lonely  majesty,  shaming  by 
His  calm  presence  their  superfluous  torches  and  superfluous  arms. 

"  Whom  are  ye  seeking  ?  "  He  asked. 

The  question  was  not  objectless.  It  was  asked,  as  St.  John  points 
out  (John  xviii.  8),  to  secure  His  Apostles  from  all  molestation ;  and 
we  may  suppose  also  that  it  served  to  make  all  who  were  present  the 
witnesses  of  His  arrest,  and  so  to  prevent  the  possibility  of  any  secret 
assassination  or  foul  play. 

"Jesus  of  Nazareth,"  they  answered. 

Their  excitement  and  awe  preferred  this  indirect  answer,  though 
if  there  could  have  been  any  doubt  as  to  who  the  speaker  was,  Judas 
waa  there — the  eye  of  the  Evangelist  noticed  him,  trying  in  vain  to 
lurk  amid  the  serried  ranks  of  the  crowd — to  prevent  any  possible 
mistake  which  might  have  been  caused  by  the  failure  of  his  premature 
and  therefore  disconcerted  signal. 


398  THE   LIFE   OP   CHRIST. 

"  I  am  He,"  said  Jesus. 

Those  quiet  words  produced  a  sudden  paroxysm  of  amazement  and 
dread.  That  answer  so  gentle  "  had  in  it  a  strength  greater  than  the 
eastern  wind,  or  the  voice  of  thunder,  for  God  was  in  that  '  still  voice/ 
and  it  struck  them  down  to  the  ground."  Instances  are  not  wanting 
in  history  in  which  the  untroubled  brow,  the  mere  glance,  the  calm 
bearing  of  some  defenceless  man,  has  disarmed  and  paralysed  his 
enemies.  The  savage  and  brutal  Gauls  could  not  lift  their  swords  to 
strike  the  majestic  senators  of  Rome.  "I  cannot  slay  Marius,"  ex- 
claimed the  barbarian  slave,  flinging  down  his  sword  and  flying  head- 
long from  the  prison  into  which  he  had  been  sent  to  murder  the  aged 
hero.  Is  there,  then,  any  ground  for  the  scoffing  scepticism  with 
which  many  have  received  St.  John's  simple  but  striking  narrative, 
that,  at  the  words  "  I  am  He,"  a  movement  of  contagious  terror  took 
place  among  the  crowd,  and,  starting  back  in  confusion,  some  of  them 
fell  to  the  ground  ?  Nothing  surely  was  more  natural.  It  must  be 
remembered  that  Judas  was  among  them ;  that  Ms  soul  was  un- 
doubtedly in  a  state  of  terrible  perturbation ;  that  Orientals  arc 
specially  liable  to  sudden  panic  ;  that  fear  is  an  emotion  eminently 
sympathetic ;  that  most  of  them  must  have  heard  of  the  mighty 
miracles  of  Jesus,  and  that  all  were  at  any  rate  aware  that  He  claimed 
to  be  a  Prophet ;  that  the  manner  in  which  He  met  this  large  multi- 
tude, which  the  alarms  of  Judas  had  dictated  as  essential  to  His 
capture,  suggested  the  likelihood  of  some  appeal  to  supernatural 
powers;  that  they  were  engaged  in  one  of  those  deeds  of  guilty 
violence  and  midnight  darkness  which  paralyse  the  stoutest  minds. 
When  we  bear  this  in  mind,  and  when  we  remember  too  that  on 
many  occasions  in  His  history  the  mere  presence  and  word  of  Christ 
had  sufficed  to  quell  the  fury  of  the  multitude,  and  to  keep  Him  safe 
in  the  midst  of  them  (Lukeiv,  30;  John  vii.  30;  viii.  59;  x.  39;  Mark 
xi.  18),  it  hardly  needs  any  recourse  to  miracle  to  account  for  the  fact 
that  these  official  marauders  and  their  infamous  guide  recoiled  from 
those  simple  words,  "  I  am  He,"  as  though  the  lightning  had  suddenly 
been  flashed  into  their  faces. 

While  they  stood  cowering  and  struggling  there,  He  again  asked 
them,  "  Whom  are  ye  seeking  ? "  Again  they  replied,  "  Jesus  of 
Nazareth."  "  I  told  you,"  He  answered,  "  that  I  am  He.  If,  then,  ye 
are  seeking  me,  let  these  go  away."  For  He  Himself  had  said  in  His 
prayer,  "  Of  those  whom  Thou  hast  given  me  have  I  lost  none." 

The  words  were  a  signal  to  the  Apostles  that  they  could  no  longer 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHK1ST.  399 

render  Him  any  service,  and  that  they  might  now  consult  their  own 
safety  if  they  would.  But  when  they  saw  that  He  meant  to  offer  no 
resistance,  that  Ho  was  indeed  about  to  surrender  Himself  to  His 
enemies,  some  pulse  of  nobleness  or  of  shame  throbbed  in  the  impe- 
tuous soul  of  Peter ;  and  hopeless  and  useless  as  all  resistance  had  now 
become,  he  yet  drew  his  sword,  and  with  a  feeble  and  ill-aimed  blow 
severed  the  ear  of  a  man  named  Malchus,  a  servant  of  the  High  Priest. 
Instantly  Jesus  stopped  the  ill-timed  and  dangerous  struggle.  "  Re- 
turn that  sword  of  thine  into  its  place,"  Ho  said  to  Peter,  "  for  all 
they  that  take  the  sword  shall  perish  with  the  sword ; "  and  then  He 
reproachfully  asked  His  rash  disciple  whether  he  really  supposed  that 
He  could  not  escape  if  He  would  ?  whether  the  mere  breathing  of  a 
prayer  would  not  secure  for  Him — had  He  not  voluntarily  intended  to 
fulfil  the  Scriptures  by  drinking  the  cup  which  His  Father  had  given 
Him — the  aid,  not  of  twelve  timid  Apostles,  but  of  more  than  twelve 
legions  of  angels?  And  then,  turning  to  the  soldiers  who  were 
holding  Him,  He  said,  "  Suffer  ye  thus  far,"  and  in  one  last  act  of 
miraculous  mercy  touched  and  healed  the  wound. 

In  the  confusion  of  the  night  this  whole  incident  seems  to  have 
passed  unnoticed  jjificept  by  a  very  few.  At  any  rate,  it  made  no 
impression  upon  ta|se  hardened  men.  Their  terror  had  quite  vanished, 
and  had  been  replaced  by  insolent  confidence.  The  Great  Prophet 
had  voluntarily  resigned  Himself  ;  He  was  their  helpless  captive.  No 
thunder  had  rolled ;  no  angel  flashed  down  from  heaven  for  Hia 
deliverance ;  no  miraculous  fire  devoured  amongst  them.  They  saw 
before  them  nothing  but  a  weary  unarmed  man,  whom  one  of  His  own 
most  intimate  followers  had  betrayed,  and  whose  arrest  was  simply 
watched  in  helpless  agony  by  a  few  terrified  Galiloeans.  They  had 
fast  hold  of  Him,  and  already  some  chief  priests,  and  elders,  and 
leading  officers  of  the  Temple-guard  had  ventured  to  come  out  of  the 
dark  background  from  which  they  had  securely  seen  His  capture,  and 
to  throng  about  Him  in  insulting  curiosity.  To  these  especially  He 
turned,  and  said  to  them,  "  Have  ye  come  out  as  against  a  robber  with 
swords  and  staves?  When  I  was  daily  with  you  in  the  Temple  ye 
did  not  stretch  out  your  hands  against  me.  But  this  is  your  hour, 
and  the  power  of  darkness."  Those  fatal  words  quenched  the  last 
gleam  of  hope  in  the  minds  of  Hia  followers.  "  Then  His  disciples, 
all  of  them" — even  the  fiery  Peter,  even  the  loving  John — "for- 
sook Him,  and  fled."  At  that  supreme  moment  only  one  un- 
known youth  —  perhaps  the  owner  of  Gethsemane,  perhaps  St. 


400  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

Mark  the  Evangelist,  perhaps  Lazarus  the  brother  of  Martha  and 
Mary — ventured  in  his  intense  excitemenb,  to  hover  on  the  out- 
skirts of  the  hostile  crowd.  He  had  apparently  been  roused  from 
sleep,  for  he  had  nothing  to  cover  him  except  the  sindon,  or  linen  sheet, 
in  which  he  had  been  sleeping.  But  the  Jewish  emissaries,  either  out 
of  the  mere  wantonness  of  a  crowd  at  seeing  a  person  in  an  unwonted 
guise,  or  because  they  resented  his  too  close  intrusion,  seized  hold  of 
the  sheet  which  he  had  wrapped  about  him ;  whereupon  he  too  was 
suddenly  terrified,  and  fled  away  naked,  leaving  the  linen  garment  in 
their  hands. 

Jesus  was  now  absolutely  alone  in  the  power  of  His  enemies.  At 
the  command  of  the  tribune  His  hands  were  tied  behind  His  back, 
and  forming  a  close  array  around  Him,  the  Roman  soldiers,  followed 
and  surrounded  by  the  Jewish  servants,  led  Him  once  more  through 
the  night,  over  the  Kedron,  and  up  the  steep  city  slope  beyond  it,  to 
the  palace  of  the  High  Priest. 


CHAPTER  LVIII. 

JESUS   BEFORE   THE    PRIESTS   AND   THE    SANHEDRIV. 

ALTHOUGH  sceptics  have  dwelt  with  disproportioned  persistency  upon  a 
multitude  of  "  discrepancies  "  in  the  fourfold  narrative  of  Christ's  trial, 
condemnation,  death,  and  resurrection,  yet  these  are  not  of  a  nature  to 
cause  the  slightest  anxiety  to  a  Christian  scholar;  nor  need  they 
awaken  the  most  momentary  distrust  in  any  one  who — even  if  ho 
have  no  deeper  feelings  in  the  matter — approaches  the  Gospels  with 
no  preconceived  theory,  whether  of  infallibility  or  of  dishonesty,  to 
support,  and  merely  accepts  them  for  that  which,  at  the  lowest,  they 
claim  to  be — histories  honest  and  faithful  up  to  the  full  knowledge  of 
the  writers,  but  each,  if  taken  alone,  confessedly  fragmentary  and 
obviously  incomplete.  After  repeated  study,  I  declare,  quite  fearlessly, 
that  though  the  slight  variations  are  numerous — though  the  lesser 
particulars  cannot  in  every  instance  be  rigidly  and  minutely 
accurate — though  no  one  of  the  narratives  taken  singly  would 
give  us  an  adequate  impression — yet,  so  far  from  there  being,  in  this 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  401 

part  of  the  Gospel  story,  any  irreconcilable  contradiction,  it  u 
perfectly  possible  to  discover  how  one  Evangelist  supplements  the 
details  furnished  by  another,  and  perfectly  possible  to  understand  the 
true  sequence  of  the  incidents  by  combining  into  one  whole  the 
separate  indications  which  they  furnish.  It  is  easy  to  call  such  com- 
binations arbitrary  and  baseless  ;  but  they  are  only  arbitrary  in  so  far 
as  we  cannot  always  be  absolutely  certain  that  the  succession  of  facts 
was  exactly  such  as  we  suppose ;  and  so  far  are  they  from  being  base- 
less, that,  to  the  careful  reader  of  the  Gospels,  they  carry  with  them 
a  conviction  little  short  of  certainty.  If  we  treat  the  Gospels  as  we 
should  treat  any  other  authentic  documents  recording  all  that  the 
authors  knew,  or  all  that  they  felt  themselves  commissioned  to  record, 
of  the  crowded  incidents  in  one  terrible  and  tumultuous  day  and 
night,  we  shall,  with  care  and  study,  see  how  all  that  they  tell  us  falls 
accurately  into  its  proper  position  in  the  general  narrative,  and  shows 
us  a  sixfold  trial,  a  quadruple  derision,  a  triple  acquittal,  a  twice- 
repeated  condemnation  of  Christ  our  Lord. 

Reading  the  Gospels  side  by  side,  we  soon  perceive  that  of  the 
three  successive  trials  which  our  J^ord  underwent  at  the  hands  of  the 
Jews,  the  first  only — that  before  Annas — is  related  to  us  by  St.  John  ; 
the  second — that  before  Caiaphas — by  St.  Matthew  and  St.  Mark ; 
the  third — that  before  the  Sanhedrin — by  St.  Luke  alone.  Nor  is 
there  anything  strange  in  this,  since  the  first  was  the  practical,  the 
second  the  potential,  the  third  the  actual  and  formal  decision,  that 
sentence  of  death  should  be  passed  judicially  upon  Him.  Each  of  the 
three  trials  might,  from  a  different  point  of  view,  have  been  regarded 
as  the  most  fatal  and  important  of  the  three.  That  of  Annas  was  the 
authoritative  praejudicium,  that  of  Caiaphas  the  real  determination, 
that  of  the  entire  Sanhedrin  at  daybreak  the  final  ratification. 

When  the  tribune,  who  commanded  the  detachment  of  Roman 
soldiers,  had  ordered  Jesus  to  be  bound,  they  led  Him  away  without 
an  attempt  at  opposition.  Midnight  was  already  passed  as  they  hurried 
Him,  from  the  moonlit  shadows  of  green  Gethsemane,  through  the 
hushed  streets  of  the  sleeping  city,  to  the  palace  of  the  High  Priest. 
It  seems  to  have  been  jointly  occupied  by  the  prime  movers  in  this 
black  iniquity,  Annas  and  his  son-in-law,  Joseph  Caiaphas.  They 
led  Him  to  Annas  first.  It  is  true  that  this  Hanan,  son  of  Seth, 
the  Ananus  of  Josephus,  and  the  Annas  of  the  Evangelists,  had  only 
been  the  actual  High  Priest  for  seven  years  (A.D.  7 — 14),  and  that 
more  than  twenty  years  before  this  period,  he  had  been  deposed  by 

2  D 


402  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

the  Procurator  Valerius  Gratus.  He  had  been  succeeded  first  by 
Ismael  Ben  Phabi,  then  by  his  son  Eleazar,  then  by  his  son-in-law, 
Joseph  Caiaphas.  But  the  priestly  families  would  not  be  likely  to 
attach  more  importance  than  they  chose  to  a  deposition  which  a  strict 
observer  of  the  Law  would  have  regarded  as  invalid  and  sacrilegious  ; 
nor  would  so  astute  a  people  as  the  Jews  be  likely  to  lack  devices 
which  would  enable  them  to  evade  the  Roman  fiat,  and  to  treat 
Annas,  if  they  wished  to  do  so,  as  their  High  Priest  de  jure,  if  not 
de  facto.  Since  the  days  of  Herod  the  Great,  the  High  Priesthood 
had  been  degraded,  from  a  permanent  religious  office,  to  a  temporary 
secular  distinction ;  and,  even  had  it  been  otherwise,  the  rude  legion- 
aries would  probably  care  less  than  nothing  to  whom  they  led  their 
victim.  '  If  the  tribune  condescended  to  ask  a  question  about  it,  it 
would  be  easy  for  the  Captain  of  the  Temple — who  may  very  probably 
have  been  at  this  time,  as  we  know  was  the  case  subsequently,  one  of 
the  sons  of  Annas  himself — to  represent  Annas  as  the  Sagan  or  Nasi — 
the  "  Deputy,"  or  the  President  of  the  Sanhedrin — and  so  as  the 
proper  person  to  conduct  the  preliminary  investigation. 

i.  Accordingly,  it  was  before  Hanan  that  Jesus  stood  first  as  a 
prisoner  at  the  tribunal  (John  xviii.  13,  19 — 24).  It  is  probable  that 
he  and  his  family  had  been  originally  summoned  by  Herod  the  Great 
from  Alexandria,  as  supple  supporters  of  a  distasteful  tyranny.  The 
Jewish  historian  calls  this  Hanan  the  happiest  man  of  his  time, 
because  he  died  at  an  advanced  old  age,  and  because  both  he  and  five 
of  his  sons  in  succession — not  to  mention  his  son-in-law — had  enjoyed 
the  shadow  of  the  High  Priesthood ;  so  that,  in  fact,  for  nearly  half 
a  century  he  had  practically  wielded  the  sacerdotal  power.  But  to  be 
admired  by  such  a  renegade  as  Josephus  is  a  questionable  advantage. 
In  spite  of  his  prosperity  he  seems  to  have  left  behind  him  but  an  evil 
name,  and  we  know  enough  of  his  character,  even  from  the  most 
unsuspected  sources,  to  recognise  in  him  nothing  better  than  an  astute, 
tyrannous,  worldly  Sadducee,  unvenerable  for  all  his  seventy  years, 
full  of  a  serpentine  malice  and  meanness  which  utterly  belied  the 
meaning  of  his  name,  and  engaged  at  this  very  moment  in  a  dark, 
disorderly  conspiracy,  for  which  even  a  worse  man  would  have  had 
cause  to  blush.  It  was  before  this  alien  and  intriguing  hierarch  that 
there  began,  at  midnight,  the  first  stage  of  that  long  and  terrible  trial 
(John  xviii.  19—24). 

And  there  was  good  reason  why  St.  John  should  have  preserved 
for  as  this  phase  of  the  trial,  and  preserved  it  apparently  for  the  express 


THE    LIFB    OF  CHRIST.  403 

reason  that  it  had  been  omitted  by  the  other  Evangelists.  It  is  not  till 
after  a  lapse  of  years  that  people  can  always  see  clearly  the  prime 
mover  in  events  with  which  they  have  been  contemporary.  At  the 
time,  the  ostensible  agent  is  the  one  usually  regarded  as  most  respon- 
sible, though  he  may  be  in  reality  a  mere  link  in  the  official  machinery. 
But  if  there  were  one  man  who  was  more  guilty  than  any  other  of  the 
death  of  Jesus,  that  man  was  Hanan.  His  advanced  age,  his  prepon- 
derant dignity,  his  worldly  position  and  influence,  as  one  who  stood  on 
the  best  terms  with  the  Herods  and  the  Procurators,  gave  an  excep- 
tional weight  to  his  prerogative  decision.  The  mere  fact  that  he 
should  have  noticed  Jesus  at  all  showed  that  he  attached  to  Hie 
teaching  a  political  significance — showed  that  he  was  at  last  afraid 
lest  Jesus  should  alienate  the  people  yet  more  entirely  from  the 
pontifical  clique  than  had  ever  been  done  by  Shemaia  or  Abtalion. 
It  is  most  remarkable,  and,  so  far  as  I  know,  has  scarcely  ever  been 
noticed,  that,  although  the  Pharisees  undoubtedly  were  actuated  by  a 
burning  hatred  against  Jesus,  and  were  even  so  eager  for  His  death  as 
to  be  willing  to  co-operate  with  the  aristocratic  and  priestly  Sadducees 
— from  whom  they  were  ordinarily  separated  by  every  kind  of 
difference,  political,  social,  and  religious — yet,  from  the  moment 
that  the  plot  for  His  arrest  and  condemnation  had  been  matured, 
the  Pharisees  took  so  little  part  in  it  that  their  name  is  not  once 
directly  mentioned  in  any  event  connected  with  the  arrest,  the  trial, 
the  derisions,  and  the  crucifixion.  The  Pharisees,  aa  such,  disappear  ; 
the  chief  priests  and  elders  take  their  place.  It  is,  indeed,  doubtful 
whether  any  of  the  more  distinguished  Pharisees  were  members  of  the 
degraded  simulacrum  of  authority  which  in  those  bad  days  still  arro- 
gated to  itself  the  title  of  a  Sanhedrin.  If  we  may  believe  not  a  few 
of  the  indications  of  the  Talmud,  that  Sanhedrin  was  little  better  than 
a  close,  irreligious,  unpatriotic  confederacy  of  monopolising  and  time- 
serving priests — the  Boethusim,  the  Kamhits,  the  Phabis,  the  family 
of  Hanan,  mostly  of  non- Palestinian  origin — who  were  supported  by 
the  government,  but  detested  by  the  people,  and  of  whom  this  bad 
conspirator  was  the  very  life  and  soul. 

And,  perhaps,  we  may  see  a  further  reason  for  the  apparent  with- 
drawal of  the  Pharisees  from  all  active  co-operation  in  the  steps  which 
accompanied  the  condemnation  and  execution  of  Jesus,  not  only  in  the 
superior  mildness  which  is  attributed  to  them,  and  in  their  comparative 
insignificance  in  the  civil  administration,  but  also  in  their  total  want  of 
sympathy  with  those  into  whose  too  fatal  toils  they  had  delivered  the 

2  D  2 


404  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

Son  of  God.  There  seems,  indeed,  to  be  a  hitherto  unnoticed  circum- 
stance which,  while  it  would  kindle  to  the  highest  degree  the  fury  ol 
the  Sadducees,  would  rather  enlist  in  Christ's  favour  the  sympathy  of 
their  rivals.  What  had  roused  the  disdainful  insouciance  of  these 
powerful  aristocrats  ?  Morally  insignificant — the  patrons  and  ad- 
herents of  opinions  which  had  so  little  hold  upon  the  people  that 
Jesus  had  never  directed  against  them  one  tithe  of  the  stern  denuncia- 
tion which  He  had  levelled  at  the  Pharisees — they  had  played  but  a 
very  minor  part  in  the  opposition  which  had  sprung  up  round  the 
Messiah's  steps.  Nay,  further  than  this,  they  would  be  wholly  at  one 
with  Him  in  rejecting  and  discountenancing  the  minute  and  casuistical 
frivolities  of  the  Oral  Law ;  they  might  even  have  rejoiced  that  they 
had  in  Him  a  holy  and  irresistible  ally  in  their  opposition  to  all  the 
Hagadoth  and  Halachoth  which  had  germinated  in  a  fungous  growth 
over  the  whole  body  of  the  Mosaic  institutions.  Whence,  then,  this 
sudden  outburst  of  the  very  deadliest  and  most  ruthless  opposition  ? 
It  is  a  conjecture  that  has  not  yet  been  made,  but  which  the  notices  of 
the  Talmud  bring  home  to  my  mind  with  strong  conviction,  that  the 
rage  of  these  priests  was  mainly  due  to  our  Lord's  words  and  acts  con- 
cerning that  House  of  God  which  they  regarded  as  their  exclusive 
domain,  and,  above  all,  to  His  second  public  cleansing  of  the  Temple. 
They  could  not  indeed  press  this  point  in  their  accusations,  because 
the  act  was  one  of  which,  secretly  at  least,  the  Pharisees,  in  all  proba- 
bility, heartily  approved;  and  had  they  urged  it  against  Him  they 
would  have  lost  all  chance  of  impressing  upon  Pilate  a  sense  of  their 
unanimity.  The  first  cleansing  might  have  been  passed  over  as  an 
isolated  act  of  zeal,  to  which  little  importance  need  be  attached,  while 
the  teaching  of  Jesus  was  mainly  confined  to  despised  and  far-off 
Galilee;  but  the  second  had  been  more  public,  and  more  vehement, 
and  had  apparently  kindled  a  more  general  indignation  against  the 
gross  abuse  which  called  it  forth.  Accordingly,  in  all  three  Evan- 
gelists we  find  that  those  who  complained  of  the  act  are  not  distinctively 
Pharisees,  but  "  Chief  Priests  and  Scribes  "  (Matt.  xxi.  15 ;  Mark  xi.  18 ; 
Luke  xix.  47),  who  seem  at  once  to  have  derived  from  it  a  fresh 
stimulus  to  seek  His  destruction. 

But,  again,  it  may  be  asked,  Is  there  any  reason  beyond  this  bold 
infraction  of  their  authority,  this  indignant  repudiation  of  an  arrange- 
ment which  they  had  sanctioned,  which  would  have  stirred  up  the  rage 
of  these  priestly  families  ?  Yes — for  we  may  assume  from  the  Talmud 
that  it  tended  to  wound  their  avarice,  to  interfere  with  tlieir  illicit  and 


TUB    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  405 

greedy  gains.  Avarice — the  besetting  sin  of  Judas — the  besetting 
sin  of  the  Je\vish  race — seems  also  to  have  been  the  besetting  sin 
of  the  family  of  Hanan.  It  was  they  who  had  founded  the  chanujoth 
— the  famous  four  shops  under  the  twin  cedars  of  Olivet — in  which 
were  sold  things  legally  pure,  and  which  they  had  manipulated 
with  such  commercial  cunning  as  artificially  to  raise  the  price  of 
doves  to  a  gold  coin  apiece,  until  the  people  were  delivered  from 
this  gross  imposition  by  the  indignant  interference  of  a  grandson  of 
Hillel.  There  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  the  shops  which  had 
intruded  even  under  the  Temple  porticoes  were  not  only  sanctioned 
by  their  authority,  but  even  managed  for  their  profit.  To  interfere 
with  these  was  to  rob  them  of  one  important  source  of  that  wealth 
and  worldly  comfort  to  which  they  attached  such  extravagant  import- 
ance. There  was  good  reason  why  Hanan,  the  head  representative  of 
"  the  viper  brood,"  as  a  Talmudic  writer  calls  them,  should  strain  to 
the  utmost  his  cruel  prerogative  of  power  to'  crush  a  Prophet  whose 
actions  tended  to  make  him  and  his  powerful  family  at  once  wholly 
contemptible  and  comparatively  poor. 

Such  then  were  the  feelings  of  bitter  contempt  and  hatred  with 
which  the  ex-High  Priest  assumed  the  initiative  in  interrogating  Jesus. 
The  fact  that  he  dared  not  avow  them — nay,  was  forced  to  keep  them 
wholly  out  of  sight — would  only  add  to  the  intensity  of  his  bitterness. 
Even  his  method  of  procedure  seems  to  have  been  as  wholly  illegal  as 
was  his  assumption,  in  such  a  place  and  at  such  an  hour,  of  any  legal 
function  whatever.  Anxious,  at  all  hazards,  to  trump  up  some  avail- 
able charge  of  secret  sedition,  or  of  unorthodox  teaching,  he  questioned 
Jesus  of  His  disciples  and  of  His  doctrine.  The  answer,  for  all  its 
calmness,  involved  a  deep  reproof.  "  J  have  spoken  openly  to  the 
world ;  I  ever  taught  in  the  synagogue  and  in  the  Temple,  where  all 
the  Jews  come  together,  and  in  secret  I  said  nothing.  Why  askest 
thou  me  ?  Ask  those  who  have  heard  me  what  I  said  to  them.  Lo  ! 
these  " — pointing,  perhaps,  to  the  bystanders — "  know  what  I  said  to 
them."  The  emphatic  repetition  of  the  "I,"  and  its  unusually  sig- 
nificant position  at  the  end  of  the  sentence,  show  that  a  contrast  was 
intended ;  as  though  Ho  had  said,  "  This  midnight,  this  sedition,  this 
secrecy,  this  indecent  mockery  of  justice,  are  yours,  not  mine.  Thero 
has  never  been  anything  esoteric  in  my  doctrine;  never  anything 
to  conceal  in  my  actions ;  no  hole-and-corner  plots  among  my  fol- 
lowers. But  thou?  and  thine?"  Even  the  minions  of  Annas  felt 
the  false  position  of  their  master  Tinder  this  calm  rebuke ;  they  felt 


406  THE   LIFE    OF   CHE1ST. 

that  before  the  transparent  innocence  of  the  youthful  Rabbi  of 
Nazareth  the  hoary  hypocrisy  of  the  crafty  Sadducee  was  abashed. 
"Answerest  thou  the  High  Priest  so  ?  "  said  one  of  them  with  a  burst 
of  illegal  insolence;  and  then,  unreproved  by  this  priestly  violator 
of  justice,  he  profaned  with  the  first  infamous  blow  the  sacred 
face  of  Christ.  Then  first  that  face  which,  as  the  poet-preacher 
says,  "  the  angels  stare  upon  with  wonder  as  infants  at  a  bright 
sunbeam,"  was  smitten  by  a  contemptible  slave.  The  insult  was  borne 
with  noble  meekness.  Even  St.  Paul,  when  similarly  insulted,  flaming 
into  sudden  anger  at  such  a  grossly  illegal  violence,  had  scathed  the 
ruffian  and  his  abettor  with  "  God  shall  smite  thee,  thou  whited 
wall "  (Acts  xxiii.  3) ;  but  He,  the  Son  of  God — He  who  was  infi- 
nitely above  all  apostles  and  all  angels — with  no  flash  of  anger, 
with  no  heightened  tone  of  natural  indignation,  quietly  reproved  the 
impudent  transgressor  with  the  words,  "  If  I  spoke  evil,  bear  witness 
concerning  the  evil ;  but  if  well,  why  smitest  thou  me  ?  "  It  was  clear 
that  nothing  more  could  be  extorted  from  Him ;  that  before  such  a 
tribunal  He  would  brook  no  further  question.  Bound,  in  sign  that 
He  was  to  be  condemned — though  unheard  and  unsentenced — Annas 
sent  Him  across  the  court-yard  to  Joseph  Caiaphas,  his  son-in-law, 
who,  not  by  the  grace  of  God,  but  by  the  grace  of  the  Roman  Pro- 
curator, was  the  titular  High  Priest. 

ii.  Caiaphas,  like  his  father-in-law,  was  a  Sadducee — equally 
astute  and  unscrupulous  with  Annas,  but  endowed  with  less  force  of 
character  and  will.  In  his  house  took  place  the  second  private  and 
irregular  stage  of  the  trial.  (Matt.  xxvi.  59 — 68  ;  Mark  xiv.  55 — 65.) 
There — for  though  the  poor  Apostles  could  not  watch  for  one  hour  in 
sympathetic  prayer,  these  nefarious  plotters  could  watch  all  night 
in  their  deadly  malice — a  few  of  the  most  desperate  enemies  of  Jesus 
among  the  Priests  and  Sadducees  were  met.  To  form  a  session  of  the 
Sanhedrin  there  must  at  least  have  been  twenty-three  members  pre- 
sent. And  we  may  perhaps  be  allowed  to  conjecture  that  this  par- 
ticular body  before  which  Christ  was  now  convened  was  mainly 
composed  of  Priests.  There  were  in  fact  three  Sanhedrins,  or  as  we 
should  rather  call  them,  committees  of  the  Sanhedrin,  which  ordi- 
narily met  at  different  places — in  tho  Lishcat  Haggazzith,  or  Paved 
Hall ;  in  the  Beth  Midrash,  or  Chamber  by  the  Partition  of  the  Temple; 
and  near  the  Gate  of  the  Temple  Mount.  Such  being  the  case,  it  is  no 
unreasonable  supposition  that  these  committees  were  composed  of 
different  elements,  and  that  one  of  them  may  have  been  mainly 


THE    LIFE    OF    CHRIST.  407 

sacerdotal  in  its  constitution.  If  so,  it  would  have  been  the  most 
likely  of  them  all,  at  the  present  crisis,  to  embrace  the  most  violent 
measures  against  One  whose  teaching  now  seemed  to  endanger  the 
very  existence  of  priestly  rule. 

But,  whatever  may  have  been  the  nature  of  the  tribunal  over  which 
Caiaphas  was  now  presiding,  it  is  clear  that  the  Priests  were  forced 
to  change  their  tactics.  Instead  of  trying,  as  Hanan  had  done,  to 
overawe  and  entangle  Jesus  with  insidious  questions,  and  so  to  involve 
Him  in  a  charge  of  secret  apostacy,  they  now  tried  to  brand  Him  with 
the  crime  of  public  error.  In  point  of  fact  their  own  bitter  divisions 
and  controversies  made  the  task  of  convicting  Him  a  very  difficult  one. 
If  they  dwelt  on  any  supposed  opposition  to  civil  authority,  that  would 
rather  enlist  the  sympathies  of  the  Pharisees  in  His  favour ;  if  they 
dwelt  on  supposed  Sabbath  violations  or  neglect  of  traditional  obser- 
vances, that  would  accord  with  the  views  of  the  Sadducees.  The 
Sadducees  dared  not  complain  of  His  cleansing  of  the  Temple  :  the 
Pharisees,  or  those  who  represented  them,  found  it  useless  to  advert  to 
His  denunciations  of  tradition.  But  Jesus,  infinitely  nobler  than  His 
own  noblest  Apostle,  would  not  foment  these  latent  animosities,  or 
evoke  for  His  own  deliverance  a  contest  of  these  slumbering  pre- 
judices. He  did  not  disturb  the  temporary  compromise  which  united 
them  in  a  common  hatred  against  Himself.  Since,  therefore,  they 
had  nothing  else  to  go  upon,  the  Chief  Priests  and  the  entire  San- 
hedrin  "  sought  false  witness  " — such  is  the  terribly  simple  expression 
of  the  Evangelists — "  sought  false  witness  against  Jesus  to  put  Him  to 
death."  Many  men,  with  a  greedy,  unnatural  depravity,  seek  false 
witness — mostly  of  the  petty,  ignoble,  malignant  sort ;  and  the  powers 
of  evil  usually  supply  it  to  them.  The  Talmud  seems  to  insinuate 
that  the  custom,  which  they  pretend  was  the  general  one,  had  been 
followed  in  the  case  of  Christ,  and  that  two  witnesses  had  been  placed 
in  concealment  while  a  treacherous  disciple — ostensibly  Judas  Iscariot 
— had  obtained  from  His  own  lips  an  avowal  of  His  claims.  This, 
however,  is  no  less  false  than  the  utterly  absurd  and  unchronological 
assertion  of  the  tract  Sanhedrin,  that  Jesus  had  been  excommunicated 
by  Joshua  Ben  Perachiah,  and  that  though  for  forty  days  a  herald 
had  proclaimed  that  he  had  brought  magic  from  Egypt  and  seduced 
the  people,  no  single  witness  came  forward  in  His  favour.  Setting 
aside  these  absurd  inventions,  we  learn  from  the  Gospels  that  though 
the  agents  of  these  priests  were  eager  to  lie,  yet  their  testimony  was 
so  false,  so  shadowy,  so  self-contradictory,  that  it  all  melted  to 


408  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

nothing,  and  even  those  unjust  and  bitter  judges  could  not  with  any 
decency  accept  it.  But  at  last  two  came  forward,  whose  false  witness 
looked  more  promising.  They  had  heard  Him  say  something  about 
destroying  the  Temple,  and  rebuilding  it  in  three  days.  According  to 
one  version  His  expression  had  been,  "  I  can  destroy  this  Temple ; " 
according  to  another,  "  I  loill  destroy  this  Temple."  The  fact  was 
that  He  had  said  neither,  but  "  Destroy  this  Temple ; "  and  the  im- 
perative had  but  been  addressed,  hypothetically,  to  them.  They  were 
to  be  the  destroyers ;  He  had  but  promised  to  rebuild.  It  was  just 
one  of  those  perjuries  which  was  all  the  more  perjured,  because  it  bore 
some  distant  semblance  to  the  truth ;  and  by  just  giving  a  different 
nuance  to  His  actual  words  they  had,  with  the  ingenuity  of  slander, 
reversed  their  meaning,  and  hoped  to  found  upon  them  a  charge  of 
constructive  blasphemy.  But  even  this  semblable  perjury  utterly 
broke  down,  and  Jesus  listened  in  silence  while  His  disunited  enemies 
hopelessly  confuted  each  other's  testimony.  Guilt  often  breaks  into 
excuses  where  perfect  innocence  is  dumb.  He  simply  suffered  His 
false  accusers  and  their  false  listeners  to  entangle  themselves  in  the 
hideous  coil  of  their  own  malignant  lies,  and  the  silence  of  the  inno- 
cent Jesus  atoned  for  the  excuses  of  the  guilty  Adam. 

But  that  majestic  silence  troubled,  thwarted,  confounded,  mad- 
dened them.  It  weighed  them  down  for  the  moment,  with  an 
incubus  of  intolerable  self-condemnation.  They  felt,  before  that 
silence,  as  if  they  were  the  culprits,  He  the  judge.  And  as  every 
poisoned  arrow  of  their  carefully-provided  perjuries  fell  harmless  at 
His  feet,  as  though  blunted  on  the  diamond  shield  of  His  white 
innocence,  they  began  to  fear  lest,  after  all,  their  thirst  for  His  blood 
would  go  unslaked,  and  their  whole  plot  fail.  Were  they  thus  to  be 
conquered  by  the  feebleness  of  their  own  weapons,  without  His 
stirring  a  finger,  or  uttering  a  word  ?  Was  this  Prophet  of  Nazareth 
to  prevail  against  them,  merely  for  lack  of  a  few  consistent  lies  ? 
Was  His  life  charmed  even  against  calumny  confirmed  by  oaths  ?  It 
was  intolerable. 

Then  Caiaphas  was  overcome  with  a  paroxysm  of  fear  and  anger. 
Starting  up  from  his  judgment-seat,  and  striding  into  the  midst — 
with  what  a  voice,  with  what  an  attitude  we  may  well  imagine  ! — 
"Answerest  Thou  NOTHING?"  he  exclaimed.  "What  is  it  that  these 
witness  against  Thee  ? "  Had  not  Jesus  been  aware  that  these  His 
judges  were  wilfully  feeding  on  ashes,  and  seeking  lies,  He  might  have 
answered ;  but  now  His  awful  silence  remained  unbroken. 


THB   LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  409 

Then,  reduced  to  utter  despair  and  fury,  this  false  High  Priest — 
with  marvellous  inconsistency,  with  disgraceful  illegality — still  stand- 
ing as  it  were  with  a  threatening  attitude  over  his  prisoner,  exclaimed, 
"  I  adjure  Thee  by  the  living  God  to  tell  us  " — what  ?  whether  Thou 
art  a  malefactor  ?  whether  Thou  hast  secretly  taught  sedition  ? 
whether  Thou  hast  openly  uttered  blasphemy  ? — no,  but  (and  surely 
the  question  showed  the  dread  misgiving  which  lay  under  all  their 
deadly  conspiracy  against  Him) — "WHETHER  THOU  ART  THE  CHRIST, 
THE  SON  OF  GOD  ?  " 

Strange  question  to  a  bound,  defenceless,  condemned  criminal ;  and 
strange  question  from  such  a  questioner — a  High  Priest  of  His  people  ! 
Strange  question  from  the  judge  who  was  hounding  on  his  false 
witnesses  against  the  prisoner!  Yet  so  adjured,  and  to  such  a 
question,  Jesus  could  not  be  silent;  on  such  a  point  He  could  not 
leave  Himself  open  to  misinterpretation.  In  the  days  of  His  happier 
ministry,  when  they  would  have  taken  Him  by  force  to  make  Him  a 
King — in  the  days  when  to  claim  the  Messiahship  in  their  sense  would 
have  been  to  meet  all  their  passionate  prejudices  half  way,  and  to  place 
Himself  upon  the  topmost  pinnacle  of  their  adoring  homage — in  those 
days  He  had  kept  His  title  of  Messiah  utterly  in  the  background  :  but 
now,  at  this  awful  decisive  moment,  when  death  was  near — when, 
humanly  speaking,  nothing  could  be  gained,  everything  must  be 
lost,  by  the  avowal — there  thrilled  through  all  the  ages — thrilled 
through  that  Eternity,  which  is  the  synchronism  of  all  the  future, 
and  all  the  present,  and  all  the  past — the  solemn  answer — "  I  AM  ; 
and  ye  shall  see  the  Son  of  Man  sitting  on  the  right  hand  of  power, 
and  coming  with  the  clouds  of  heaven."  In  that  answer  the  thunder 
rolled — a  thunder  louder  than  at  Sinai,  though  the  ears  of  the  cynic 
and  the  Sadducee  heard  it  not  then,  nor  hear  it  now.  In  overacted 
and  ill-omened  horror,  the  unjust  judge  who  had  thus  supplemented 
the  failure  of  the  perjuries  which  he  had  vainly  sought — the  false 
High  Priest  rending  his  linen  robes  before  the  True — demanded  of  the 
assembly  His  instant  condemnation. 

"  BLASPHEMY  !  "  he  exclaimed ;  "  what  further  need  have  we  of 
witnesses  ?  See,  now  ye  heard  his  blasphemy !  What  is  your 
decision  ?  "  And  with  the  confused  tumultuous  cry,  "  He  is  ish 
maveth,"  "A  man  of  death,"  "Guilty  of  death,"  the  dark  conclave 
was  broken  up,  and  the  second  stage  of  the  trial  of  Jesus  was  over. 


410  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

CHAPTER   LIX. 

THE   INTERVAL   BETWEEN   THE   TRIALS. 

AND  this  was  how  the  Jews  at  last  received  their  promised  Messiah — 
longed  for  with  passionate  hopes  during  two  thousand  years ;  since 
then  regretted  in  bitter  agony  for  well-nigh  two  thousand  more  ! 
From  this  moment  He  was  regarded  by  all  the  apparitors  of  the 
Jewish  Court  as  a  heretic,  liable  to  death  by  stoning ;  and  was  only 
remanded  into  custody  to  be  kept  till  break  of  day,  because  by  daylight 
only,  and  in  the  Lishcat  Haggazzith,  or  Hall  of  Judgment,  and  only  by 
a  full  session  of  the  entire  Sanhedrin,  could  He  be  legally  condemned. 
And  since  now  they  looked  upon  Him  as  a  "  fit  person  to  be  insulted 
with  impunity,  He  was  haled  through  the  court-yard  to  the  guard- 
room with  blows  and  curses,  in  which  it  may  be  that  not  only  the 
attendant  menials,  but  even  the  cold  but  now  infuriated  Sadducees 
took  their  share.  It  was  now  long  past  midnight,  and  the  spring  air 
was  then  most  chilly.  In  the  centre  of  the  court  the  servants  of  the 
priests  were  warming  themselves  under  the  frosty  starlight  as  they 
stood  round  a  fire  of  coals.  And  as  He  was  led  past  that  fire  He 
heard — what  was  to  Him  a  more  deadly  bitterness  than  any  -which 
His  brutal  persecutors  could  pour  into  His  cup  of  anguish — He  heard 
His  boldest  Apostle  denying  Him  with  oaths. 

Tor  during  these  two  sad  hours  of  His  commencing  tragedy,  as  He 
stood  in  the  Halls  of  Annas  and  of  Caiaphas,  another  moral  tragedy, 
which  He  had  already  prophesied,  had  been  taking  place  in  the  outer 
court. 

As  far  as  we  can  infer  from  the  various  narratives,  the  palace  in 
Jerusalem,  conjointly  occupied  by  Annas  the  real,  and  Caiaphas  the 
titular  High  Priest,  seems  to  have  been  built  round  a  square  court, 
and  entered  by  an  arched  passage  or  vestibule ;  and  on  the  farther  side 
of  it,  probably  up  a  short  flight  of  steps,  was  the  hall  in  which  the 
committee  of  the  Sanhedrin  had  met.  Timidly,  and  at  a  distance,  two 
only  of  the  Apostles  had  so  far  recovered  from  their  first  panic  as  to 
follow  far  in  the  rear  of  the  melancholy  procession.  One  of  these — 
the  beloved  disciple — known  perhaps  to  the  High  Priest's  household 
as  a  young  fisherman  of  the  Lake  of  Galilee — had  found  ready  admit- 
tance, with  no  attempt  to  conceal  his  sympathies  or  his  identity.  Not 
60  the  other.  Unknown,  and  a  Galilaoan,  he  had  been  stopped  at  the 


THE   LIFE    01   CUBIST.  411 

door  by  the  youthful  portress.  Better,  far  better,  had  his  exclusion 
been  final.  For  it  was  a  night  of  tumult,  of  terror,  of  suspicion ;  and 
Peter  was  weak,  and  his  intense  love  was  mixed  with  fear,  and  yet  he 
was  venturing  into  the  very  thick  of  his  most  dangerous  enemies.  But 
John,  regretting  that  he  should  be  debarred  from  entrance,  and  judging 
perhaps  of  his  friend's  firmness  by  his  own,  exerted  his  influence  to 
obtain  admission  for  him.  With  bold  imprudence,  and  concealing  the 
better  motives  which  had  brought  him  thither,  Peter,  warned  though 
he  had  been,  but  warned  in  vain,  walked  into  the  court-yard,  and  sat 
down  in  the  very  middle  of  the  servants  of  the  very  men  before  whom 
at  that  moment  his  Lord  was  being  arraigned  on  a  charge  of  death. 
The  portress,  after  the  admission  of  those  concerned  in  the  capture, 
seems  to  have  been  relieved  (as  was  only  natural  at  that  late  hour)  by 
another  maid,  and  advancing  to  the  group  of  her  fellow-servants,  she 
fixed  a  curious  and  earnest  gaze  on  the  dubious  stranger  as  he  sat  full 
in  the  red  glare  of  the  firelight,  and  then,  with  a  flash  of  recognition,  she 
exclaimed,  "  Why,  you,  as  well  as  the  other,  were  with  Jesus  of  Galilee." 
Peter  was  off  his  guard.  At  this  period  of  life  his  easy  impressionable 
nature  was  ever  liable  to  be  moulded  by  the  influence  of  the  moment, 
and  he  passed  readily  into  passionate  extremes.  Long,  long  afterwards, 
we  find  a  wholly  unexpected  confirmation  of  the  probability  of  this  sad 
episode  of  his  life,  in  the  readiness  with  which  he  lent  himself  to  the 
views  of  the  Apostle  of  the  Gentiles,  and  the  equal  facility  with  which 
a  false  shame,  and  a  fear  of  "  them  which  were  of  the  circumcision, 
made  him  swerve  into  the  wrong  and  narrow  properties  of  "  certain 
which  came  from  James."  And  thus  it  was  that  the  mere  curious 
question  of  an  inquisitive  young  girl  startled  him  by  its  very  sudden, 
ness  into  a  quick  denial  of  his  Lord.  Doubtless,  at  the  moment,  it 
presented  itself  to  him  as  a  mere  prudent  evasion  of  needless  danger. 
But  did  he  hope  to  stop  there  ?  Alas,  "  once  denied  "  is  always  "  thrice 
denied;"  and  the  sudden  "manslaughter  upon  truth"  always,  and 
rapidly,  developes  into  its  utter  and  deliberate  murder;  and  a  lie  is 
like  a  stone  set  rolling  upon  a  mountain-side,  which  is  instantly  beyond 
its  utterer's  control. 

For  a  moment,  perhaps,  his  denial  was  accepted,  for  it  had  been 
very  public,  and  very  emphatic.  But  it  warned  him  of  his  danger. 
Guiltily  he  slinks  away  again  from  the  glowing  brazier  to  the  arched 
entrance  of  the  court,  as  the  crowing  of  a  cock  smote,  not  quite  un- 
heeded, on  his  guilty  ear.  His  respite  was  very  short.  The  portress 
— part  of  whose  duty  it  was  to  draw  attention  to  dubious  strangers — 


412  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

had  evidently  gossiped  about  him  to  the  servant  who  had  relieved  her 
in  charge  of  the  door.  Some  other  idlers  were  standing  about,  and 
this  second  maid  pointed  him  out  to  them  as  having  certainly  been 
with  Jesus  of  Nazareth.  A  lie  seemed  more  than  ever  necessary  now, 
and  to  secure  himself  from  all  further  molestation  he  even  confirmed 
it  with  an  oath.  But  now  flight  seemed  impossible,  for  it  would  only 
confirm  suspicion  ;  so  with  desperate,  gloomy  resolution  he  once  more 
— with  feelings  which  can  barely  be  imagined — joined  the  unfriendly 
and  suspicious  group  who  were  standing  round  the  fire. 

A  whole  hour  passed :  for  him  it  must  have  been  a  fearful  hour, 
and  one  never  to  be  forgotten.  The  temperament  of  Peter  was  far 
too  nervous  and  vehement  to  suffer  him  to  feel  at  ease  under  this 
new  complication  of  ingratitude  and  falsehood.  If  he  remain  silent 
among  these  priestly  servitors,  he  is  betrayed  by  the  restless  self- 
consciousness  of  an  evil  secret  which  tries  in  vain  to  simulate  indiffer- 
ence ;  if  he  brazen  it  out  with  careless  talk,  he  is  fatally  betrayed 
by  his  Galilsean  burr.  It  is  evident  that,  in  spite  of  denial  and  of 
oath,  they  wholly  distrust  and  despise  him ;  and  at  last  one  of  tho 
High  Priest's  servants — a  kinsman  of  the  wounded  Malchus — onco 
more  strongly  and  confidently  charged  him  with  having  been  with 
Jesus  in  the  garden,  taunting  him,  in  proof  of  it,  with  the  misplaced 
gutturals  of  his  provincial  dialect.  The  others  joined  in  the  accusation. 
Unless  he  persisted,  all  was  lost  which  might  seem  to  have  been  gained. 
Perhaps  one  more  effort  would  set  him  quite  free  from  these  trouble- 
some charges,  and  enable  him  to  wait  and  see  the  end.  Pressed  closer 
and  closer  by  the  sneering,  threatening  band  of  idle  servitors — sinking 
deeper  and  deeper  into  the  mire  of  faithlessness  and  fear — "  then  began 
he  to  curse  and  to  swear,  saying,  I  know  not  the  man."  And  at  that 
fatal  moment  of  guilt,  which  might  well  have  been  for  him  the  moment 
of  an  apostacy  as  fatal  and  final  as  had  been  that  of  his  brother  Apostlo 
— at  that  fatal  moment,  while  those  shameless  curses  still  quivered  on 
the  air — first  the  cock  crew  in  the  cold  grey  dusk,  and  at  tho  same 
moment,  catching  the  last  accents  of  those  perjured  oaths,  either 
through  the  open  portal  of  the  judgment-hall,  or  as  He  was  led 
past  the  group  at  the  fireside  through  the  open  court,  with  rude 
pushing  and  ribald  jeers,  and  blows  and  spitting — the  Lord — the 
Lord  in  the  agony  of  His  humiliation,  in  the  majesty  of  His  silence 
— "the  Lord  turned  and  looked  upon  Peter."  Blessed  are  those  on 
whom,  when  He  looks  in  sorrow,  the  Lord  looks  also  with  love  !  It 
was  enough.  Like  an  arrow  through  his  inmost  soul,  shot  the  mute 


THE    LIFK    OF   CHRIST.  413 

eloquent  anguish  of  that  reproachful  glance.  As  the  sunbeam  smites 
the  last  hold  of  snow  upon  the  rock,  ere  it  rushes  in  avalanche  down 
the  tormented  hill,  so  the  false  self  of  the  fallen  Apostle  slipped  away. 
It  was  enough :  "he  saw  no  more  enemies,  he  knew  no  more  danger,  he 
feared  no  more  death."  Flinging  the  fold  of  his  mantle  over  his  head, 
he  too,  like  Judas,  rushed  forth  into  the  night.  Into  the  night,  but 
not  aa  Judas ;  into  the  unsunned  outer  darkness  of  miserable  self-con- 
demnation, but  not  into  the  midnight  of  remorse  and  of  despair ;  into 
the  night,  but,  as  has  been  beautifully  said,  it  was  "  to  meet  the 
morning  dawn."  If  the  angel  of  Innocence  had  left  him,  the  angel 
of  Repentance  took  him  gently  by  the  hand.  Sternly,  yet  tenderly,  the 
spirit  of  grace  led  up  this  broken-hearted  penitent  before  the  tribunal 
of  his  own  conscience,  and  there  his  old  life,  his  old  shame,  his  old 
weakness,  his  old  self  was  doomed  to  that  death  of  godly  sorrow  which 
was  to  issue  in  a  new  and  a  nobler  birth. 

And  it  was  this  crime,  committed  against  Him  by  the  man  who  had 
first  proclaimed  Him  as  the  Christ — who  had  come  to  Him  over  the 
stormy  water — who  had  drawn  the  sword  for  Him  in  Gethsemane — 
who  had  affirmed  so  indignantly  that  he  would  die  with  Him  rather  than 
deny  Him — it  was  this  denial,  confirmed  by  curses,  that  Jesus  heard 
immediately  after  He  had  been  condemned  to  death,  and  at  the  very 
commencement  of  His  first  terrible  derision.  For,  in  the  guard- 
room to  which  He  was  remanded  to  await  the  break  of  day,  all  the 
ignorant  malice  of  religious  hatred,  all  the  narrow  vulgarity  of  brutal 
spite,  all  the  cold  innate  cruelty  which  lurks  under  the  abjectness 
of  Oriental  servility,  was  let  loose  against  Him.  His  very  meekness, 
His  very  silence,  His  very  majesty — the  very  stainlessness  of  His 
innocence,  the  very  grandeur  of  His  fame — every  divine  circumstance 
and  quality  which  raised  Him  to  a  height  so  infinitely  immeasurable 
above  His  persecutors — all  these  made  Him  an  all  the  more  welcome 
victim  for  their  low  and  devilish  ferocity.  They  spat  in  His  face ; 
they  smote  Him  with  rods ;  they  struck  Him  with  their  closed  fists 
and  with  their  open  palms.  In  the  fertility  of  their  furious  and 
hateful  insolence,  they  invented  against  Him  a  sort  of  game.  Blind- 
folding His  eyes,  they  hit  Him  again  and  again,  with  the  repeated 
question,  "Prophesy  to  us,  O  Messiah,  who  it  is  that  smote  thee." 
So  they  wiled  away  the  dark  cold  hours  till  the  morning,  revenging 
themselves  upon  His  impassive  innocence  for  their  own  present 
vileness  and  previous  terror ;  and  there,  in  the  midst  of  that  savage 
and  wanton  varletry,  the  Son  of  God,  bound  and  blindfold^  stood  in 


414  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

His  long  and  silent  agony,  defenceless  aud  alone.  It  was  His  first 
derision — His  derision  as  tlie  Christ,  the  Judge  attainted,  the  Holy 
One  a  criminal,  the  Deliverer  in  bonds. 

iii.  At  last  the  miserable  lingering  hours  were  over,  and  the  grey 
dawn  shuddered,  and  the  morning  blushed  upon  that  memorable  day. 
And  with  the  earliest  dawn — for  so  the  Oral  Law  ordained,  and  they 
who  could  trample  on  all  justice  and  all  mercy  were  yet  scrupulous 
about  all  the  infinitely  little — Jesus  was  led  into  the  Lishcat  Hag- 
gazzith,  or  Paved  Hall  at  the  south-east  of  the  Temple,  or  perhaps  into 
the  Ghanujoth,  or  "  Shops,"  which  owed  their  very  existence  to  Hanan 
and  his  family,  where   the  Sanhedrin  had  been  summoned,  for  His 
third  trial,  but  His  first  formal  and  legal  trial  (Luke  xxii.  66 — 71). 
It  was  now  probably  about  six  o'clock  in  the  morning,  and  a  full 
session  met.     Well-nigh  all — for  there  were  the  noble  exceptions  at 
least  of  Nicodemus  and  of  Joseph  of  Arimathea,  and  we  may  hope 
also   of    Gamaliel,    the   grandson    of   Hillel — were   inexorably   bent 
upon  His  death.     The  Priests  were  there,  whose  greed  and  selfish- 
ness He  had  reproved ;  the  Elders,  whose  hypocrisy  He  had  branded  ; 
the   Scribes,   whose  ignorance  He  had  exposed;    and,   worse  than 
all,  the  worldly,  sceptical,  would-be  philosophic  Sadducees,  always  the 
most  cruel  and  dangerous  of  opponents,   whose  empty  sapience  He 
had  so  grievously  confuted.     All  these  were  bent  upon  His  death ;  all 
filled  with  repulsion  at  that  infinite  goodness ;  all  burning  with  hatred 
against  a  nobler  nature  than  any  which  they  could  even  conceive  in 
their  loftiest  dreams.     And  yet  their  task  in  trying  to  achieve  His 
destruction  was  not  easy.      The  Jewish  fables  of  His  death  in  the 
Talmud,  which  are  shamelessly  false  from  beginning  to  end,  say  that 
for  forty  days,  though  summoned  daily  by  heraldic  proclamation,  not 
one  person  came  forward,  according  to  custom,  to  maintain  His  inno- 
cence, and  that  consequently  He  was  first  stoned  as  a  seducer  of  the 
people  (mesith'),  and  then  hung  on  the  accursed  tree.     The  fact  was 
that  the  Sanhedrists  had  not  the  power  of  inflicting  death,  and  even 
if  the  Pharisees  would  have  ventured  to  usurp  it  in  a  tumultuary 
sedition,  as  they  afterwards  did  in  the  case  of  Stephen,  the  less  fanatic 
and  more  cosmopolitan  Sadducees  would  be  less  likely  to  do  so.     Not 
content,  therefore,  with  the  cherem,  or  ban  of  greater  excommuni- 
cation, their  only  way  to  compass  His  death  was  to  hand  Him  over  to 
the  secular  arm.     At  present  they  had  only  against  Him  a  charge  of 
constructive  blasphemy,  founded  on  an  admission  forced  from  Him  by 
the  High  Priest,  when  even  their  own  suborned  witnesses  had  failed 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  415 

to  perjure   themselves  to  their  satisfaction.      There  were  many  old 
accusations  against  Him  on  which  they  could  not  rely.     His  violations 
of  the  Sabbath,  as  they  called  them,  were  all  connected  with  mira- 
cles,  and  brought  them,   therefore,   upon   dangerous   ground.     His 
rejection  of  oral  tradition  involved  a  question  on  which  Saddncees 
and  Pharisees  were  at  deadly  feud.      His    authoritative    cleansing 
of  the  Temple  might  be  regarded  with  favour  both  by  the  Rabbis 
and  the   people.      The  charge   of  esoteric   evil   doctrines   had  been 
refuted  by  the  utter  publicity  of  His  life.     The  charge  of  open  here- 
sies had  broken  down,  from  the  total  absence  of  supporting  testimony. 
The  problem  before  them  was  to  convert  the  ecclesiastical  charge  of 
constructive  blasphemy  into  a  civil  charge  of  constructive  treason. 
But  how  could  this  be  done  ?    Not  half  the  members  of  the  Sanhedrin 
had  been   present   at  the  hurried,  nocturnal,   and  therefore  illegal, 
session  in  the  house  of  Caiaphas;  yet  if  they  were  all  to  condemn 
Him  by  a  formal  sentence,  they  must  all  hear  something  on  which  to 
found  their  vote.     In  answer  to  the  adjuration  of  Caiaphas,  He  had 
solemnly  admitted  that  He  was  the  Messiah  and  the  Son  of  God.     The 
latter  declaration  would  have  been  meaningless  as  a  charge  against 
Him  before  the  tribunal  of  the  Romans ;  but  if  He  would  repeat  the 
former,  they  might  twist  it  into  something  politically  seditious.     But 
He  would  not  repeat  it,  in  spite  of  their  insistence,  because  He  knew 
that  it  was  open  to  their  wilful  misinterpretation,  and  because  they 
were  evidently  acting  in  flagrant  violation  of  their  own  express  rules 
and  traditions,  which  demanded  that  every  arraigned  criminal  should 
be  regarded  and  treated  as  innocent  until  his  guilt  was  actually  proved. 
Perhaps,  as  they  sat  there  with  their  King,  bound  and  helpless 
before  them,  standing  silent  amid  their  clamorous  voices,  one  or  two 
of  their  most  venerable  members  may  have  recalled  the  very  different 
scene  when  Shemaia  (Sameas)  alone  had  broken  the  deep  silence  of 
their  own  cowardly  terror  upon  their  being  convened  to  pass  judgment 
on  Herod  for  his  murders.     On  that  occasion,  as  Sameas  had  pointed 
out,  Herod  had  stood  before  them,  not  "  in  a  submissive  manner,  with 
his  hair  dishevelled,  and   in  a  black   and  mourning  garment,"  but 
"  clothed  in  purple,  and  with  the  hair  of  his  head  finely  trimmed,  and 
with  his  armed  men  about  him."     And  since  no  one  dared,  for  very 
fear,  even  to  mention  the  charges  against  him,  Shemaia  had  prophesied 
that  the  day  of  vengeance  should  come,  and  that  the  very  Herod 
before  whom  they  and  their  prince  Hyrcanus  were  trembling,  would 
one  day  be  the  minister  of  God's  anger  against  both  him  and  them 


416  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

What  a  contrast  was  the  present  scene  with  that  former  one  of  half  a 
century  before !  Now  they  were  clamorous,  their  King  was  silent ; 
they  were  powerful,  their  King  defenceless ;  they  guilty,  their  King 
divinely  innocent ;  they  the  ministers  of  earthly  wrath,  their  King  the 
arbiter  of  Divine  retribution. 

But  at  last,  to  end  a  scene  at  once  miserable  and  disgraceful,  Jesus 
spoke.  "If  I  tell  you,"  He  said,  "ye  will  not  believe  ;  and  if  I  ask 
you  a  question,  you  will  not  answer  me."  Still,  lest  they  should  have 
any  excuse  for  failing  to  understand  who  He  was,  He  added  in  tones 
of  solemn  warning,  "  But  henceforth  shall  the  Son  of  Man  sit  on  the 
right  hand  of  the  power  of  God."  "Art  thou  then,"  they  all  ex- 
claimed, "the  Son  of  God?"  "Ye  say  that  I  am,"  He  answered, 
in  a  formula  with  which  they  were  familiar,  and  of  which  they 
understood  the  full  significance.  And  then  they  too  cried  out,  as 
Caiaphas  had  done  before,  "  What  further  need  have  we  of  witness  ? 
for  we  ourselves  heard  from  His  own  mouth."  And  so  in  this  third 
condemnation  by  Jewish  authority — a  condemnation  which  they 
thought  that  Pilate  would  simply  ratify,  and  so  appease  their  burning 
hate — ended  the  third  stage  of  the  trial  of  our  Lord.  And  this 
sentence  also  seems  to  have  been  followed  by  a  second  derision  re- 
sembling the  first,  but  even  more  full  of  insult,  and  worse  to  bear  than 
the  former,  inasmuch  as  the  derision  of  Priests,  and  Elders,  and 
Sadducees  is  even  more  repulsively  odious  than  that  of  menials  and 
knaves. 

Terribly  soon  did  the  Nemesis  fall  on  the  main  actor  in  the  lower 
stages  of  this  iniquity.  Doubtless  through  all  those  hours  Judas  had 
been  a  secure  spectator  of  all  that  had  occurred,  and  when  the 
morning  dawned  upon  that  chilly  night,  and  he  knew  the  decision  of 
the  Priests  and  of  the  Sanhedrin,  and  saw  that  Jesus  was  now  given 
over  for  crucifixion  to  the  Roman  Governor,  then  he  began  fully  to 
realise  all  that  he  had  done.  There  is  in  a  great  crime  an  awfully 
illuminating  power.  It  lights  up  the  theatre  of  the  conscience  with 
an  unnatural  glare,  and,  expelling  the  twilight  glamour  of  self- 
interest,  shows  the  actions  and  motives  in  their  full  and  true  aspect. 
In  Judas,  as  in  so  many  thousands  before  and  since,  this  opening  of 
the  eyes  which  follows  the  consummation  of  an  awful  sin  to  which 
many  other  sins  have  led,  drove  him  from  remorse  to  despair,  from 
despair  to  madness,  from  madness  to  suicide.  Had  he,  even  then,  but 
gone  to  his  Lord  and  Saviour,  and  prostrated  himself  at  His  feet  to 
implore  forgiveness,  all  might  have  been  well.  But,  alas !  he  went 


THE   LIFE    OP   CHEIST.  417 

instead  to  the  patrons  and  associates  and  tempters  of  his  crime. 
From  them  he  met  with  no  pity,  no  coansel.  He  was  a  despised  and 
broken  instrument,  and  now  he  was  tossed  aside.  They  met  his  mad- 
dening remorse  with  chilly  indifference  and  callous  contempt.  "  1 
have  sinned,"  he  shrieked  to  them,  "in  that  I  have  betrayed  innocent 
blood."  Did  He  expect  them  to  console  his  remorseful  agony,  to  share 
the  blame  of  his  guilt,  to  excuse  and  console  him  with  their  lofty 
dignity  ?  "  What  is  that  to  us  ?  See  thou  to  that,"  was  the  sole  and 
heartless  reply  they  deigned  to  the  poor  traitor  whom  they  had 
encouraged,  welcomed,  incited  to  his  deed  of  infamy.  He  felt  that 
he  was  of  no  importance  any  longer ;  that  in  guilt  there  is  no 
possibility  for  mutual  respect,  no  basis  for  any  feeling  but  mutual 
abhorrence.  His  paltry  thirty  pieces  of  silver  were  all  that  he 
would  get.  For  these  he  had  sold  his  soul ;  and  these  he  should 
no  more  enjoy  than  Achan  enjoyed  the  gold  he  buried,  or 
Ahab  the  garden  he  had  seized.  Flinging  them  wildly  down 
upon  the  pavement  into  the  holy  place  where  the  priests  sat, 
and  into  which  he  might  not  enter,  he  hurried  into  the  despairing 
solitude  from  which  he  would  never  emerge  alive.  In  that  soli- 
tude, we  may  never  know  what  "  unclean  wings "  were  napping 
about  his  head.  Accounts  differed  as  to  the  wretch's  death.  The 
probability  is  that  the  details  were  never  accurately  made  public. 
According  to  one  account,  he  hung  himself,  and  tradition  still  points 
in  Jerusalem  to  a  ragged,  ghastly,  wind-swept  tree,  which  is  called 
the  "tree  of  Judas."  According  to  another  version — not  irrecon- 
cilable with  the  first,  if  we  suppose  that  a  rope  or  a  branch  broke 
under  his  weight — he  fell  headlong,  burst  asunder  in  the  midst,  and 
all  his  bowels  gushed  out  (Acts  i.  18).  According  to  a  third — 
current  among  the  early  Christians — his  body  swelled  to  a  huge  size, 
under  some  hideous  attack  of  elephantiasis,  and  he  was  crushed  by  a 
passing  wagon.  The  arch-conspirators,  in  their  sanctimonious  scru- 
pulosity, would  not  put  the  blood-money  which  he  had  returned  into 
the  "  Corban,"  or  sacred  treasury,  but,  after  taking  counsel,  bought 
with  it  the  potter's  field  to  bury  strangers  in — a  plot  of  ground  which 
perhaps  Judas  had  intended  to  purchase,  and  in  which  he  met  his  end. 
That  field  was  long  known  and  shuddered  at  as  the  Aceldama,  or  "  field 
of  blood,"  a  place  foul,  haunted,  and  horrible. 


2  • 


418  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

CHAPTER  LX. 

JESUS     BEFORE     PILATE. 

"  SUFFERED  under  Pontius  Pilate  " — so,  in  every  creed  of  Christendom, 
is  the  unhappy  name  of  the  Roman  procurator  handed  down  to  eternal 
execration.  Yet  the  object  of  introducing  that  name  was  not  to  point 
a  moral,  but  to  fix  an  epoch ;  and,  in  point  of  fact,  of  all  the  civil  and 
ecclesiastical  rulers  before  whom  Jesus  was  brought  to  judgment, 
Pilate  was  the  least  guilty  of  malice  and  hatred,  the  most  anxious,  if 
not  to  spare  His  agony,  at  least  to  save  His  life. 

What  manner  of  man  was  this  in  whose  hands  were  placed,  by 
power  from  above,  the  final  destinies  of  the  Saviour's  life  ?  Of  his 
origin,  and  of  his  antecedents  before  A.D.  26,  when  he  became  the 
sixth  Procurator  of  Judaea,  but  little  is  known.  In  rank  he  belonged 
to  the  ordo  equester,  and  he  owed  his  appointment  to  the  influence  of 
Sejanus.  His  name  "  Pontius  "  seems  to  point  to  a  Samnite  extrac- 
tion ;  his  cognomen  "  Pilatus  "  to  a  warlike  ancestry.  His  praenomen, 
if  he  had  one,  has  not  been  preserved.  In  Judsea  he  had  acted  with 
all  the  haughty  violence  and  insolent  cruelty  of  a  typical  Roman 
governor.  Scarcely  had  he  been  well  installed  as  Procurator,  when, 
allowing  his  soldiers  to  bring  with  them  by  night  the  silver  eagles  and 
other  insignia  of  the  legions  from  Caesarea  to  the  Holy  City,  he 
excited  a  furious  outburst  of  Jewish  feeling  against  an  act  which 
they  regarded  as  idolatrous  profanation.  For  five  days  and  nights — 
often  lying  prostrate  on  the  bare  ground — they  surrounded  and  almost 
stormed  his  residence  at  Ceesarea  with  tumultuous  and  threatening 
entreaties,  and  could  not  be  made  to  desist  on  the  sixth,  even  by 
the  peril  of  immediate  and  indiscriminate  massacre  at  the  hands  of  the 
soldiers  whom  he  sent  to  surround  them.  He  had  then  sullenly  given 
way,  and  this  foretaste  of  the  undaunted  and  fanatical  resolution  of 
the  people  with  whom  he  had  to  deal,  went  far  to  embitter  his  whole 
administration  with  a  sense  of  overpowering  disgust. 

The  outbreak  of  the  Jews  on  a  second  occasion  was  perhaps  less 
justifiable,  but  it  might  easily  have  been  avoided,  if  Pilate  would 
have  studied  their  character  a  little  more  considerately,  and  paid 
more  respect  to  their  dominant  superstition.  Jerusalem  seems  to 
have  always  suffered,  as  it  does  very  grievously  to  this  day,  from 
a  bad  and  deficient  supply  of  water.  To  remedy  this  inconvenience, 


THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  419 

Pilate  undertook  to  build  an  aqueduct,  by  which  water  could  be 
brought  from  the  "  Pools  of  Solomon."  Regarding  this  as  a  matter 
of  public  benefit,  he  applied  to  the  purpose  some  of  the  money  from 
the  "Corban,"  or  sacred  treasury,  and  the  people  rose  in  furious 
myriads  to  resent  this  secular  appropriation  of  their  sacred  fund. 
Stung  by  their  insults  and  reproaches,  Pilate  disguised  a  number  of 
his  soldiers  in  Jewish  costume,  and  sent  them  among  the  mob,  with 
staves  and  daggers  concealed  under  their  garments,  to  punish  the 
ringleaders.  Upon  the  refusal  of  the  Jews  to  separate  quietly,  a 
signal  was  given,  and  the  soldiers  carried  out  their  instructions  with 
such  hearty  good- will,  that  they  wounded  and  beat  to  death  not  a  few 
both  of  the  guilty  and  the  innocent,  and  created  so  violent  a  tumult 
that  many  perished  by  being  trodden  to  death  under  the  feet  of  the 
terrified  and  surging  mob.  Thus,  in  a  nation  which  produced  the 
sicarii,  Pilate  had  given  a  fatal  precedent  of  sicarian  conduct;  the 
Assassins  had  received  from  their  Procurator  an  example  of  the  use  of 
political  assassination. 

A  third  seditious  tumult  must  still  more  have  embittered  the  disgust 
of  the  Roman  Governor  for  his  subjects,  by  showing  him  how  impos- 
sible it  was  to  live  among  such  people — even  in  a  conciliatory  spirit — 
without  outraging  some  of  their  sensitive  prejudices.  In  the  Herodian 
palace  at  Jerusalem,  which  he  occupied  during  the  festivals,  he  had 
hung  some  gilt  shields  dedicated  to  Tiberius.  In  the  speech  of  Agrippa 
before  the  Emperor  Grams,  as  narrated  by  Philo,  this  act  is  attributed 
to  wanton  malice ;  but  since,  by  the  king's  own  admission,  the  shields 
were  perfectly  plain,  and  were  merely  decorated  with  a  votive  inscrip- 
tion, it  is  fair  to  suppose  that  the  Jews  had  taken  offence  at  what  Pilate 
simply  intended  for  a  harmless  private  ornament;  and  one  which,  more- 
over, he  could  hardly  remove  without  some  danger  of  offending  the 
gloomy  and  suspicious  Emperor  to  whose  honour  they  were  dedicated. 
Since  he  would  not  give  way,  the  chief  men  of  the  nation  wrote  a 
letter  of  complaint  to  Tiberius  himself.  It  was  a  part  of  Tiberius's 
policy  to  keep  the  provinces  contented,  and  his  masculine  intellect 
despised  the  obstinacy  which  would  risk  an  insurrection  rather  than 
sacrifice  a  whim.  He  therefore  reprimanded  Pilate,  and  ordered  the 
obnoxious  shields  to  be  transferred  from  Jerusalem  to  the  Temple  of 
Augustus  at  Ceesarea. 

The  latter  incident  is  related  by  Philo  only ;  and  besides  these  three 
outbreaks,  we  hear  in  the  Gospels  of  some  wild  tumult  in  which  Pilate 
had  mingled  the  blood  of  the  Galilseans  with  their  sacrifices.  He  was 

2  E  2 


420  THE   LIFE   OF  CUEIST. 

finally  expelled  from  his  Procuratorsliip  in  consequence  of  an  accusa- 
tion preferred  against  him  by  the  Samaritans,  who  complained  to  Lucius 
Vitellius,  the  Legate  of  Syria,  that  he  had  wantonly  attacked,  slain, 
and  executed  a  number  of  them  who  had  assembled  on  Mount  G-eriziin 
by  the  invitation  of  an  impostor — possibly  Simon  Magus — who  pro- 
mised to  show  them  the  Ark  and  sacred  vessels  of  the  Temple,  which, 
he  said,  had  been  concealed  there  by  Moses.  The  conduct  of  Pilate 
seems  on  this  occasion  to  have  been  needlessly  prompt  and  violent; 
and  although,  when  he  arrived  at  Rome,  he  found  that  Tiberius  was 
dead,  yet  even  Gaius  refused  to  reinstate  him  in  his  government, 
thinking  it  no  doubt  a  bad  sign  that  he  should  thus  have  become  un- 
pleasantly involved  with  the  people  of  every  single  district  in  his 
narrow  government.  Sejanus  had  shown  the  most  utter  dislike  against 
the  Jews,  and  Pilate  probably  reflected  his  patron's  antipathies. 

Such  was  Pontius  Pilate,  whom  the  pomps  and  perils  of  the  great 
yearly  festival  had  summoned  from  his  usual  residence  at  Casarea 
Philippi  to  the  capital  of  the  nation  which  he  detested,  and  the  head- 
quarters of  a  fanaticism  which  he  despised.  At  Jerusalem  he  occupied 
one  of  the  two  gorgeous  palaces  which  had  been  erected  there  by  the 
lavish  architectural  extravagance  of  the  first  Herod.  It  was  situated 
in  the  Upper  City  to  the  south-west  of  the  Temple  Hill,  and  like  the 
similar  building  at  Crosarea,  having  passed  from  the  use  of  the  pro- 
vincial king  to  that  of  the  Roman  governor,  was  called  Herod's  Pros- 
torium  (Acts  xxiii.  35).  It  was  one  of  those  luxurious  abodes, 
"  surpassing  all  description,"  which  were  in  accordance  with  the 
tendencies  of  the  age,  and  on  which  Josephus  dwells  with  ecstasies  of 
admiration.  Between  its  colossal  wings  of  white  marble — called 
respectively  Csesareum  and  Agrippeum,  in  the  usual  spirit  of  Herodian 
flattery  to  the  Imperial  house — was  an  open  space  commanding  a  noble 
view  of  Jerusalem,  adorned  with  sculptured  porticos  and  columns 
of  many-coloured  marble,  paved  with  rich  mosaics,  varied  with 
fountains  and  reservoirs,  and  green  promenades  which  furnished 
a  delightful  asylum  to  flocks  of  doves.  Externally  it  was  a  mass  of 
lofty  walls,  and  towers,  and  gleaming  roofs,  mingled  in  exquisite 
varieties  of  splendour;  within,  its  superb  rooms,  largo  enough  to 
accommodate  a  hundred  guests,  were  adorned  with  gorgeous  furniture 
and  vessels  of  gold  and  silver.  A  magnificent  abode  for  a  mere  Roman 
knight !  and  yet  the  furious  fanaticism  of  the  populace  at  Jerusalem 
made  it  a  house  so  little  desirable,  that  neither  Pilate  nor  his  pre- 
decessors seem  to  have  cared  to  enjoy  its  luxuries  for  more  than  a  few 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  421 

weeks  in  the  whole  year.  They  were  forced  to  be  present  in  the  Jewish 
capital  during  those  crowded  festivals  which  were  always  liable  to  be 
disturbed  by  some  outburst  of  inflammable  patriotism,  and  they  soon 
discovered  that  even  a  gorgeous  palace  can  furnish  but  a  repulsive 
residence  if  it  be  built  on  the  heaving  lava  of  a  volcano. 

In  that  kingly  palace — such  as  in  His  days  of  freedom  He  had 
never  trod — began,  in  three  distinct  acts,  the  fourth  stage  of  that 
agitating  scene  which  preceded  the  final  agonies  of  Christ.  It  was 
unlike  the  idle  inquisition  of  Annas — the  extorted  confession  of 
Caiaphas — the  illegal  decision  of  the  Sanhedrin ;  for  here  His  judge 
was  in  His  favour,  and  with  all  the  strength  of  a  feeble  pride,  and  all 
the  daring  of  a  guilty  cowardice,  and  all  the  pity  of  which  a  blood- 
stained nature  was  capable,  did  strive  to  deliver  Him.  This  last  trial 
is  full  of  passion  and  movement :  it  involves  a  threefold  change  of 
scene,  a  threefold  accusation,  a  threefold  acquittal  by  the  Romans,  a 
threefold  rejection  by  the  Jews,  a  threefold  warning  to  Pilate,  and 
a  threefold  effort  on  his  part,  made  with  ever-increasing  energy  and 
ever-deepening  agitation,  to  baffle  the  accusers  and  to  set  the  victim 
free. 

1.  It  was  probably  about  seven  in  the  morning  that,  thinking  to 
overawe  the  Procurator  by  their  numbers  and  their  dignity,  the  im- 
posing procession  of  the  Sanhedrists  and  Priests,  headed,  no  doubt,  by 
Caiaphas  himself,  conducted  Jesus,  with  a  cord  round  His  neck,  from 
their  Hall  of  Meeting  over  the  lofty  bridge  which  spanned  the  Valley 
of  the  Tyropooon,  in  presence  of  all  the  city,  with  the  bound  hands  of 
a  sentenced  criminal,  a  spectacle  to  angels  and  to  men. 

Disturbed  at  this  early  hour,  and  probably  prepared  for  some 
Paschal  disturbance  more  serious  than  usual,  Pilate  entered  the  Hall 
of  Judgment,  whither  Jesus  had  been  led,  in  company  (as  seems  clear) 
with  a  certain  number  of  His  accusers  and  of  those  most  deeply  inte- 
rested in  His  case.  But  the  great  Jewish  hierarchs,  shrinking  from 
ceremonial  pollution,  though  not  from  moral  guilt — afraid  of  leaven, 
though  not  afraid  of  innocent  blood — refused  to  enter  the  Gentile's 
hall,  lest  they  should  be  polluted,  and  should  consequently  be  unable 
that  night  to  eat  the  Passover.  In  no  good  humour,  but  in  haughty 
and  half-necessary  condescension  to  what  he  would  regard  as  the 
despicable  superstitions  of  an  inferior  race,  Pilate  goes  out  to  them 
under  the  burning  early  sunlight  of  an  Eastern  spring.  One  haughty 
glance  takes  in  the  pompous  assemblage  of  priestly  notables,  and  the 
turbulent  mob  of  this  singular  people,  equally  distasteful  to  him  as  a 


422  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

Roman  and  as  a  ruler;  and  observing  in  that  one  glance  the  fierce 
passions  of  the  accusers,  as  he  had  already  noted  the  meek  ineffable 
grandeur  of  their  victim,  his  question  is  sternly  brief :  "What  accusa- 
tion bring  ye  against  this  man  ?  "  The  question  took  them  by  surprise, 
and  showed  them  that  they  must  be  prepared  for  an  unconcealed 
antagonism  to  all  their  purposes.  Pilate  evidently  intended  a  judicial 
inquiry ;  they  had  expected  only  a  licence  to  kill,  and  to  kill,  not  by  a 
Jewish  method  of  execution,  but  by  one  which  they  regarded  as  more 
hoi'rible  and  accursed  (Deut.  xxi.  22,  23).  "If  He  were  not  a  male- 
factor," is  their  indefinite  and  surly  answer,  "  we  would  not  have 
delivered  Him  up  unto  thee."  But  Pilate's  Roman  knowledge  of 
law,  his  Roman  instinct  of  justice,  his  Roman  contempt  for  their 
murderous  fanaticism,  made  him  not  choose  to  act  upon  a  charge  so 
entirely  vague,  nor  give  the  sanction  of  his  tribunal  to  their  dark  dis- 
orderly decrees.  He  would  not  deign  to  be  an  executioner  where  he 
had  not  been  a  judge.  "Very  well,"  he  answered,  with  a  superb  con- 
tempt, "  take  ye  Him  and  judge  Him  according  to  your  law.  But  now 
they  are  forced  to  the  humiliating  confession  that,  having  been  deprived 
of  the  jus  gladii,  they  cannot  inflict  the  death  which  alone  will  satisfy 
them ;  for  indeed  it  stood  written  in  the  eternal  councils  that  Christ 
was  to  die,  not  by  Jewish  stoning  or  strangulation,  but  by  that  Roman 
form  of  execution  which  inspired  the  Jews  with  a  nameless  horror,  even 
by  crucifixion ;  that  He  was  to  reign  from  His  cross — to  die  by  that 
most  fearfully  significant  and  typical  of  deaths — public,  slow,  conscious, 
accursed,  agonising — worse  even  than  burning — the  worst  type  of  all 
possible  deaths,  and  the  worst  result  of  that  curse  which  He  was  to 
remove  for  ever.  Dropping,  therefore,  for  the  present,  the  charge  of 
blasphemy,  which  did  not  suit  their  purpose,  they  burst  into  a  storm  of 
invectives  against  Him,  in  which  are  discernible  the  triple  accusations, 
that  He  perverted  the  nation,  that  He  forbade  to  give  tribute,  that  He 
called  Himself  a  king.  All  three  charges  were  flagrantly  false,  and 
the  third  all  the  more  so  because  it  included  a  grain  of  truth.  But 
since  they  had  not  confronted  Jesus  with  any  proofs  or  witnesses, 
Pilate,  in  whose  whole  bearing  and  language  is  manifest  the  disgust 
embittered  by  fear  with  which  the  Jews  inspired  him — deigns 
to  notice  the  third  charge  alone,  and  proceeds  to  discover  whether 
the  confession  of  the  prisoner — always  held  desirable  by  Roman 
institutions — would  enable  him  to  take  any  cognizance  of  it.  Leaving 
the  impatient  Sanhedrin  and  the  raging  crowd,  he  retired  into  the 
Judgment  Hall.  St.  John  alone  preserves  for  us  the  memorable  scene. 


THE    LIFE   OF   CUBIST.  423 

Jesus,  though  not  "  in  soft  clothing,"  though  not  a  denizen  of  kings' 
houses,  had  been  led  up  the  noble  flight  of  stairs,  over  the  floors  of 
agate  and  lazuli,  under  the  gilded  roofs,  ceiled  with  cedar  and  painted 
with  vermilion,  which  adorned  but  one  abandoned  palace  of  a  great 
king  of  the  Jews.  There,  amid  those  voluptuous  splendours,  Pilate — 
already  interested,  already  feeling  in  this  prisoner  before  him  some 
nobleness  which  touched  his  Roman  nature— asked  Him  in  pitying 
wonder,  "  Art  thou  the  King  of  the  Jews  ?  " — thou  poor,  worn,  tear- 
stained  outcast  in  this  hour  of  thy  bitter  need — oh,  pale,  lonely, 
friendless,  wasted  man,  in  thy  poor  peasant  garments,  with  thy  tied 
hands,  and  the  foul  traces  of  the  insults  of  thine  enemies  on  thy  face, 
and  on  thy  robes — thou,  so  unlike  the  fierce  magnificent  Herod,  whom 
this  multitude  which  thirsts  for  thy  blood  acknowledged  as  their 
sovereign — art  thou  the  King  of  the  Jews  ?  There  is  a  royalty  which 
Pilate,  and  men  like  Pilate,  cannot  understand — a  royalty  of  holiness, 
a  supremacy  of  self-sacrifice.  To  say  "  No  "  would  have  been  to  belie 
the.  truth  ;  to  say  "  Yes  "  would  have  been  to  mislead  the  questioner. 
"  Sayest  thou  this  of  thyself  ?  "  He  answered  with  gentle  dignity,  "  or 
did  others  tell  it  thee  of  me?"  "Am  I  &Jew?"  is  the  disdainful 
answer.  "  Thy  own  nation  and  the  chief  priests  delivered  thee  unto 
me.  What  hast  thou  done?"  Done  ? — works  of  wonder,  and  mercy, 
and  power,  and  innocence,  and  these  alone.  But  Jesus  reverts  to  the 
first  question,  now  that  He  has  prepared  Pilate  to  understand  the 
answer :  "  Yes,  He  is  a  king  ;  but  not  of  this  world ;  not  from  hence  ; 
not  one  for  whom  His  servants  would  fight."  "  Thou  art  a  king, 
then  ?"  said  Pilate  to  Him  in  astonishment.  Yes  !  but  a  king  not  in 
this  region  of  falsities  and  shadows,  but  one  born  to  bear  witness  unto 
the  truth,  and  one  whom  all  who  were  of  the  truth  should  hear. 
"  Truth,"  said  Pilate  impatiently,  "  what  is  truth  ?"  What  had  he— a 
busy,  practical  Roman  governor — to  do  with  such  dim  abstractions  ? 
what  bearing  had  they  on  the  question  of  life  and  death?  what 
unpractical  hallucination,  what  fairyland  of  dreaming  phantasy  was 
this  ?  Yet,  though  he  contemptuously  put  the  discussion  aside,  he 
was  touched  and  moved.  A  judicial  mind,  a  forensic  training,  fami- 
liarity with  human  nature  which  had  given  him  some  insight  into  the 
characters  of  men,  showed  him  that  Jesus  was  not  only  wholly  inno- 
cent, but  infinitely  nobler  and  better  than  His  raving  sanctimonious 
accusers.  He  wholly  set  aside  the  floating  idea  of  an  unearthly 
royalty ;  he  saw  in  the  prisoner  before  his  tribunal  an  innocent  and 
high-souled  dreamer,  nothing  more.  And  so,  leaving  Jesus  there,  he 


424  THE    LIFE    OF    CHRIST. 

went  out  again  to  the  Jews,  and  pronounced  his  first  emphatic  and 
unhesitating  acquittal :  "  I  FIND  IN  HIM  NO  FAULT  AT  ALL." 

2.  But  this  public  decided  acquittal  only  kindled  the  fury  of  His 
enemies  into  yet  fiercer  flame.  After  all  that  they  had  hazarded,  after 
all  that  they  had  inflicted,  after  the  sleepless  night  of  their  plots, 
adjurations,  insults,  was  their  purpose  to  be  foiled  after  all  by  the 
intervention  of  the  very  Gentiles  on  whom  they  had  relied  for  its  bitter 
consummation  ?  Should  this  victim  whom  they  had  thus  clutched  in 
their  deadly  grasp,  be  rescued  from  High  Priests  and  rulers  by  the 
contempt  or  the  pity  of  an  insolent  heathen  ?  It  was  too  intolerable  ! 
Their  voices  rose  in  wilder  tumult.  "  He  was  a  mesUTi ;  He  had  upset 
the  people  with  His  teaching  through  the  length  and  breadth  of  the 
land,  beginning  from  Galilee,  even  as  far  as  here." 

Amid  these  confused  and  passionate  exclamations  the  practised  ear 
of  Pilate  caught  the  name  of  "  Galilee,"  and  he  understood  that  Galilee 
had  been  the  chief  scene  of  the  ministry  of  Jesus.  Eager  for  a  chance 
of  dismissing  a  business  of  which  he  was  best  pleased  to  be  free,  he  pro- 
posed, by  a  master-stroke  of  astute  policy,  to  get  rid  of  an  embarrassing 
prisoner,  to  save  himself  from  a  disagreeable  decision,  and  to  do  an 
unexpected  complaisance  to  the  unfriendly  Galilaean  tetrarch,  who,  as 
usual,  had  come  to  Jerusalem — nominally  to  keep  the  Passover,  really 
to  please  his  subjects,  and  to  enjoy  the  sensations  and  festivities 
offered  at  that  season  by  the  densely-crowded  capital.  Accordingly, 
Pilate,  secretly  glad  to  wash  his  hands  of  a  detestable  responsibility, 
sent  Jesus  to  Herod  Antipas,  who  was  probably  occupying  the  old 
Asmonaean  palace,  which  had  been  the  royal  residence  at  Jerusalem 
until  it  had  been  surpassed  by  the  more  splendid  one  which  the 
prodigal  tyrant,  his  father,  had  built.  And  so,  through  the  thronged 
and  narrow  streets,  amid  the  jeering,  raging  multitudes,  the  weary 
Sufferer  was  dragged  once  more. 

"We  have  caught  glimpses  of  this  Herod  Antipas  before,  and  I  do 
not  know  that  all  History,  in  its  gallery  of  portraits,  contains  a  much 
more  despicable  figure  than  this  wretched,  dissolute  Idumsean  Sad- 
ducee — this  petty  princeling  drowned  in  debauchery  and  blood.  To 
him  was  addressed  the  sole  purely  contemptuous  expression  that  Jesus 
is  ever  recorded  to  have  used  (Luke  xiii.  32).  Superstition  and  in- 
credulity usually  go  together;  avowed  atheists  have  yet  believed  in 
augury,  and  men  who  do  not  believe  in  God  will  believe  in  ghosts. 
Antipas  was  rejoiced  beyond  all  things  to  see  Jesus.  He  had  long 
been  wanting  to  see  Him  because  of  the  rumours  he  had  heard;  and 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  425 

this  murderer  of  the  prophets  hoped  that  Jesus  would,  in  compliment 
to  royalty,  amuse  by  some  miracle  his  gaping  curiosity.  He  harangued 
and  questioned  Him  in  many  words,  but  gained  not  so  much  as  one 
syllable  in  reply.  Our  Lord  confronted  all  his  ribald  questions  with  the 
majesty  of  silence.  To  such  a  man,  who  even  changed  scorn  into  a  virtue, 
speech  would  clearly  have  been  a  profanation.  Then  all  the  savage 
vulgarity  of  the  man  came  out  through  the  thin  veneer  of  a  superficial 
cultivation.  For  the  second  time  Jesus  is  derided — derided  this  time  as 
Priest  and  Prophet.  Herod  and  his  corrupt  hybrid  myrmidons  "  set 
Him  at  nought " — treated  Him  with  the  insolence  of  a  studied  con- 
tempt. Mocking  His  innocence  and  His  misery  in  a  festal  and  shining 
robe,  the  empty  and  wicked  prince  sent  Him  back  to  the  Procurator, 
to  whom  he  now  became  half-reconciled  after  a  long-standing  enmity. 
But  ho  contented  himself  with  these  cruel  insults.  He  resigned  to  the 
forum  apprehensionis  all  further  responsibility  as  to  the  issue  of  the 
trial.  Though  the  Chief  Priests  and  Scribes  stood  about  his  throne 
unanimously  instigating  him  to  a  fresh  and  more  heinous  act  of 
murder  by  their  intense  accusations,  he  practically  showed  that  he 
thought  their  accusations  frivolous,  by  treating  them  as  a  jest.  It 
was  the  fifth  trial  of  Jesus ;  it  was  His  second  public  distinct 
acquittal. 

3.  And  now,  as  He  stood  once  more  before  the  perplexed  and 
wavering  Governor,  began  the  sixth,  the  last,  the  most  agitating  and 
agonising  phase  of  this  terrible  inquisition.  Now  was  the  time  for 
Pilate  to  have  acted  on  a  clear  and  right  conviction,  and  saved  himself 
for  ever  from  the  guilt  of  innocent  blood.  He  came  out  once  more, 
and  seating  himself  on  a  stately  lema — perhaps  the  golden  throne  of 
Archelans,  which  was  placed  on  the  elevated  pavement  of  many- 
coloured  marble — summoned  the  Priests,  the  Sanhedrists,  and  the 
people  before  him,  and  seriously  told  them  that  they  had  brought 
Jesus  to  his  tribunal  as  a  leader  of  sedition  and  turbulence ;  that  after 
full  and  fair  inquiry  he,  their  Roman  Governor,  had  found  their 
prisoner  absolutely  guiltless  of  these  charges  ;  that  he  had  then  sent 
Him  to  Herod,  their  native  king,  and  that  he  also  had  come  to  the 
conclusion  that  Jesus  had  committed  no  crime  which  deserved  the 
punishment  of  death.  And  now  came  the  golden  opportunity  for  him 
to  vindicate  the  grandeur  of  his  country's  imperial  justice,  and,  as  he 
had  pronounced  Him  absolutely  innocent,  to  set  Him  absolutely  free. 
But  exactly  at  that  point  he  wavered  and  temporised.  The  dread  of 
another  insurrection  haunted  him  like  a  nightmare.  He  was  willing 


426  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

to  go  half  way  to  please  these  dangerous  sectaries.  To  justify  them, 
as  it  were,  in  their  accusation,  he  would  chastise  Jesus — scourge  Him 
publicly,  as  though  to  render  His  pretensions  ridiculous — disgrace  and 
ruin  Him — "  make  Him  seem  vile  in  their  eyes  " — and  then  set  Him 
free.  And  this  notion  of  setting  Him  free  suggested  to  him  (mother 
resource  of  tortuous  policy.  Both  he  and  the  people  almost  simul- 
taneously bethought  themselves  that  it  had  always  been  a  Paschal 
boon  to  liberate  at  the  feast  some  condemned  prisoner.  He  offered, 
therefore,  to  make  the  acquittal  of  Jesus  an  act  not  of  imperious 
justice,  but  of  artificial  grace. 

In  making  this  suggestion — in  thus  flagrantly  tampering  with  his 
innate  sense  of  right,  and  resigning  against  his  will  the  best  preroga- 
tive of  his  authority — he  was  already  acting  in  spite  of  a  warning 
which  he  had  received.  That  first  warning  consisted  in  the  deep  mis- 
giving, the  powerful  presentiment,  which  overcame  him  as  he  looked 
on  his  bowed  and  silent  prisoner.  But,  as  though  to  strengthen  him 
in  his  resolve  to  prevent  an  absolute  failure  of  all  justice,  he  now 
received  a  second  solemn  warning — and  one  which  to  an  ordinary 
Roman,  and  a  Roman  who  remembered  Caesar's  murder  and  Cal- 
purnia's  dream,  might  well  have  seemed  divinely  sinister.  His  own 
wife — Claudia  Procula — ventured  to  send  him  a  public  message,  even 
as  he  sat  there  on  his  tribunal,  that,  in  the  morning  hours,  when  dreams 
are  true,  she  had  had  a  troubled  and  painful  dream  about  that  Just 
Man;  and,  bolder  than  her  husband,  she  bade  him  beware  how  he 
molested  Him. 

Gladly,  most  gladly,  would  Pilate  have  yielded  to  his  own  presenti- 
ments— have  gratified  his  pity  and  his  justice — have  obeyed  the  pro- 
hibition conveyed  by  this  mysterious  omen.  Gladly  even  would  he 
have  yielded  to  the  worse  and  baser  instinct  of  asserting  his  power, 
and  thwarting  these  envious  and  hated  fanatics,  whom  he  knew  to  be 
ravening  for  innocent  blood.  That  they — to  many  of  whom  sedition 
was  as  the  breath  of  life — should  be  sincere  in  charging  Jesus  with 
sedition  was,  as  he  well  knew,  absurd.  Their  utterly  transparent 
hypocrisy  in  this  matter  only  added  to  his  undisguised  contempt.  If 
he  could  have  dared  to  show  his  real  instincts,  he  would  have  driven 
them  from  his  tribunal  with  all  the  haughty  insouciance  of  a  Gallic. 
But  Pilate  was  guilty,  and  guilt  is  cowardice,  and  cowardice  is  weak- 
ness. His  own  past  cruelties,  recoiling  in  kind  on  his  own  head,  forced 
him  now  to  crush  the  impulse  of  pity,  and  to  add  to  his  many  cruelties 
another  more  heinous  still.  He  knew  that  serious  complaints  hung 


THE    LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  427 

over  his  head.  Those  Samaritans  whom  he  had  insulted  and  oppressed 
— those  Jews  whom  he  had  stabbed  promiscuously  in  the  crowd  by  the 
hands  of  his  disguised  and  secret  emissaries — those  Galilseans  whose 
blood  he  had  mingled  with  their  sacrifices — was  not  their  blood  crying 
for  vengeance  ?  Was  not  an  embassy  of  complaint  against  him 
imminent  even  now  ?  Would  it  not  be  dangerously  precipitated  if, 
in  so  dubious  a  matter  as  a  charge  of  claiming  a  kingdom,  he  raised  a 
tumult  among  a  people  in  whose  case  it  was  the  best  interest  of  the 
Romans  that  they  should  hug  their  chains  ?  Dare  he  stand  the  chance 
of  stirring  up  a  new  and  apparently  terrible  rebellion  rather  than  con- 
descend to  a  simple  concession,  which  was  rapidly  assuming  the  aspect 
of  a  politic,  and  even  necessary,  compromise  ? 

His  tortuous  policy  recoiled  on  his  own  head,  and  rendered  im- 
possible his  own  wishes.  The  Nemesis  of  his  past  wrong-doing 
was  that  He  could  no  longer  do  right.  Hounded  on  by  the  Priests 
and  Sanhedrists,  the  people  impetuously  claimed  the  Paschal  boon  of 
which  he  had  reminded  them ;  but  in  doing  so  they  unmasked  still 
more  decidedly  the  sinister  nature  of  their  hatred  against  their 
Redeemer.  For  while  they  were  professing  to  rage  against  the 
asserted  seditiousness  of  One  who  was  wholly  obedient  and  peaceful, 
they  shouted  for  the  liberation  of  a  man  whose  notorious  sedition  had 
been  also  stained  by  brigandage  and  murder.  Loathing  the  innocent, 
they  loved  the  guilty,  and  claimed  the  Procurator's  grace  on  behalf, 
not  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  but  of  a  man  who,  in  the  fearful  irony  of 
circumstance,  was  also  called  Jesus — Jesus  Bar-Abbas — who  not  only 
was  what  they  falsely  said  of  Christ,  a  leader  of  sedition,  but  also  a 
robber  and  a  murderer.  It  was  fitting  that  they,  who  had  preferred 
an  abject  Sadducee  to  their  true  priest,  and  an  incestuous  Idumaean  to 
their  Lord  and  King,  should  deliberately  prefer  a  murderer  to  their 
Messiah. 

It  may  be  that  Bar- Abbas  had  been  brought  forth,  and  that  thus 
Jesus  the  scowling  murderer  and  Jesus  the  innocent  Redeemer  stood 
together  on  that  high  tribunal  side  by  side.  The  people,  persuaded 
by  their  priests,  clamoured  for  the  liberation  of  the  rebel  and  the 
robber.  To  him  every  hand  was  pointed ;  for  him  every  voice  was 
raised.  For  the  Holy,  the  Harmless,  the  Undefiled — for  Him  whom  a 
thousand  Hosannas  had  greeted  but  five  days  before — no  word  of  pity 
or  of  pleading  found  an  utterance.  "  He  was  despised  and  rejected  of 
men." 

Deliberately  putting  the   question  to    them,   Pilate  heard  with 


428  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

scornful  indignation  their  deliberate  choice;  and  then,  venting  his 
bitter  disdain  and  anger  in  taunts,  which  did  but  irritate  them,  more, 
without  serving  any  good  purpose,  "What  then,"  he  scornfully  asked 
"do  ye  wish  me  to  do  with  the  King  of  the  Jews  ?  "  Then  first  broke 
out  the  mad  scream,  "  Crucify  !  crucify  him !  "  In  vain,  again  and 
again,  in  the  pauses  of  the  tumult,  Pilate  insisted,  obstinately  indeed, 
but  with  more  and  more  feebleness  of  purpose — for  none  but  a  man 
more  innocent  than  Pilate,  even  if  he  were  a  Roman  governor,  could 
have. listened  without  quailing  to  the  frantic  ravings  of  an  Oriental 
mob — "  Why,  what  evil  hath  He  done  ?  "  "I  found  no  cause  of  death 
in  Him."  "  I  will  chastise  Him  and  let  Him  go."  Such  half- willed 
opposition  was  wholly  unavailing.  It  only  betrayed  to  the  Jews  the 
inward  fears  of  their  Procurator,  and  practically  made  them  masters 
of  the  situation.  Again  and  again,  with  wilder  and  wilder  vehemence, 
they  rent  the  air  with  those  hideous  yells — "Alpe  TOVTOV.  ^AiroKvcrov 
ijfuv  Bapa/3{3dv.  ZravpOKrov,  (rravpcoaov — "Away  with  this  man." 
"  Loose  unto  us  Bar- Abbas."  "  Crucify  !  crucify  !  " 

For  a  moment  Pilate  seemed  utterly  to  yield  to  the  storm.  Ha  let 
Bar- Abbas  free ;  he  delivered  Jesus  over  to  be  scourged.  The  word 
used  for  the  scourging  (<j>pcvye\\oi>cra<;)  implies  that  it  was  done,  not 
with  rods  (virgae),  for  Pilate  had  no  lictors,  but  with  what  Horace 
calls  the  "  horribile  flagellum,"  of  which  the  Russian  knout  is  the 
only  modern  representative.  This  scourging  was  the  ordinary  pre- 
liminary to  crucifixion  and  other  forms  of  capital  punishment.  It  was 
a  punishment  so  truly  horrible,  that  the  mind  revolts  at  it ;  and  it  has 
long  been  abolished  by  that  compassion  of  mankind  which  has  been  so 
greatly  intensified,  and  in  some  degree  even  created,  by  the  gradual 
comprehension  of  Christian  truth.  The  unhappy  sufferer  was  pub- 
licly stripped,  was  tied  by  the  hands  in  a  bent  position  to  a  pillar,  and 
then,  on  the  tense  quivering  nerves  of  the  naked  back,  the  blows  were 
inflicted  with  leathern  thongs,  weighted  with  jagged  edges  of  bone 
and  lead ;  sometimes  even  the  blows  fell  by  accident — sometimes,  with 
terrible  barbarity,  were  purposely  struck — on  the  face  and  eyes.  It 
was  a  punishment  so  hideous  that,  under  its  lacerating  agony,  the 
victim  generally  fainted,  often  died ;  still  more  frequently  a  man  was 
sent  away  to  perish  under  the  mortification  and  nervous  exhaustion 
which  ensued.  And  this  awful  cruelty,  on  which  we  dare  not  dwell — 
this  cruelty  which  makes  the  heart  shudder  and  grow  cold — was 
followed  immediately  by  the  third  and  bitterest  derision — the  derision 
of  Christ  as  King. 


TUB    LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  429 

In  civilised  nations  all  is  done  that  can  be  done  to  spare  every 
needless  suffering  to  a  man  condemned  to  death;  but  among  the 
Romans  insult  and  derision  were  the  customary  preliminaries  to  the 
last  agony.  The  "  et  pereuntibus  addita  ludibria "  of  Tacitus  might 
stand  for  their  general  practice.  Such  a  custom  furnished  a  specimen  of 
that  worst  and  lowest  form  of  human  wickedness  which  delights  to  in- 
flict pain,  which  feels  an  inhuman  pleasure  in  gloating  over  the  agonies 
of  another,  even  when  he  has  done  no  wrong.  The  mere  spectacle  of 
agony  is  agreeable  to  the  degraded  soul.  The  low  vile  soldiery  of  the 
Praetorium — not  Romans,  who  might  have  had  more  sense  of  the  inborn 
dignity  of  the  silent  sufferer,  but  mostly  the  mere  mercenary  scum  and 
dregs  of  the  provinces — led  Him  into  their  barrack-room,  and  there 
mocked,  in  their  savage  hatred,  the  King  whom  they  had  tortured.  It 
added  keenness  to  their  enjoyment  to  have  in  their  power  One  who 
was  of  Jewish  birth,  of  innocent  life,  of  noblest  bearing.  The  oppor- 
tunity broke  so  agreeably  the  coarse  monotony  of  their  life,  that  they 
summoned  all  of  the  cohort  who  were  disengaged  to  witness  their 
brutal  sport.  In  sight  of  these  hardened  ruffians  they  went  through 
the  whole  heartless  ceremony  of  a  mock  coronation,  a  mock  investiture, 
a  mock  homage.  Around  the  brows  of  Jesus,  in  wanton  mimicry  of 
the  Emperor's  laurel,  they  twisted  a  green  wreath  of  thorny  leaves ;  in 
His  tied  and  trembling  hands  they  placed  a  reed  for  sceptre ;  from  His 
torn  and  bleeding  shoulders  they  stripped  the  white  robe  with  which 
Herod  had  mocked  Him — which  must  now  have  been  all  soaked  with 
blood — and  flung  on  Him  an  old  scarlet  paludament — some  cast-off 
war  cloak,  with  its  purple  laticlave,  from  the  Praetorian  wardrobe. 
This,  with  feigned  solemnity,  they  buckled  over  His  right  shoulder, 
with  its  glittering  fibula ;  and  then — each  with  his  derisive  homage  of 
bended  knee — each  with  his  infamous  spitting — each  with  the  blow 
over  the  head  from  the  reed  sceptre,  which  His  bound  hands  could  not 
hold — they  kept  passing  before  Him  with  their  mock  salutation  of 
"  Hail,  King  of  the  Jews !  " 

Even  now,  even  yet,  Pilate  wished,  hoped,  even  strove  to  save 
Him.  He  might  represent  this  frightful  scourging,  not  as  the  pre- 
liminary to  crucifixion,  but  as  an  inquiry  by  torture,  which  had  failed 
to  elicit  any  further  confession.  And  as  Jesus  came  forth — as  He 
stood  beside  him  with  that  martyr-form  on  the  beautiful  mosaic  of  the 
tribunal — the  spots  of  blood  upon  His  green  wreath  of  torture,  the 
mark  of  blows  and  spitting  on  His  countenance,  the  weariness  of  His 
deathf ul  agony  upon  the  sleepless  eyes,  the  sagum,  of  faded  scarlet, 


430  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

darkened  by  the  weals  of  His  lacerated  back,  and  dropping,  it  may 
be,  its  stains  of  crimson  upon  the  tesselated  floor — even  then,  even  so, 
in  that  hour  of  His  extremest  humiliation — yet,  as  He  stood  in  the 
grandeur  of  His  holy  calm  on  that  lofty  tribunal  above  the  yelling 
crowd,  there  shone  all  over  Him  so  Godlike  a  pre-eminence,  so  divine 
a  nobleness,  that  Pilate  broke  forth  with  that  involuntary  exclamation 
which  has  thrilled  with  emotion  so  many  million  hearts — 

"BEHOLD  THE  MAN!  " 

But  his  appeal  only  woke  a  fierce  outbreak  of  the  scream,  "Crucify! 
crucify ! "  The  mere  sight  of  Him,  even  in  this  His  unspeakable  shame 
and  sorrow,  seemed  to  add  fresh  fuel  to  their  hate.  In  vain  the 
heathen  soldier  appeals  for  humanity  to  the  Jewish  priest ;  no  heart 
throbbed  with  responsive  pity ;  no  voice  of  compassion  broke  that 
monotonous  yell  of  "  Crucify !  " — the  howling  refrain  of  their  wild 
"  liturgy  of  death."  The  Roman  who  had  shed  blood  like  water,  on 
the  field  of  battle,  in  open  massacre,  in  secret  assassination,  might  well 
be  supposed  to  have  an  icy  and  a  stony  heart ;  but  yet  icier  and  stonier 
was  the  heart  of  those  scrupulous  hypocrites  and  worldly  priests. 
"  Take  ye  Him,  and  crucify  Him,"  said  Pilate,  in  utter  disgust,  "  for 
I  find  no  fault  in  Him."  What  an  admission  from  a  Roman  judge  ! 
"  So  far  as  I  can  see,  He  is  wholly  innocent ;  yet  if  you  must  crucify 
Him,  take  Him  and  crucify.  I  cannot  approve  of,  but  I  will  readily 
connive  at,  your  violation  of  the  law."  But  even  this  wretched  guilty 
subterfuge  is  not  permitted  him.  Satan  will  have  from  his  servants 
the  full  tale  of  their  crimes,  and  the  sign-manual  of  their  own  willing 
assent  at  last.  What  the  Jews  want — what  the  Jews  will  have — is  not 
tacit  connivance,  but  absolute  sanction.  They  see  their  power.  They 
see  that  this  blood-stained  Governor  dares  not  hold  out  against  them  ; 
they  know  that  the  Roman  statecraft  is  tolerant  of  concessions  to  local 
superstition.  Boldly,  therefore,  they  fling  to  the  winds  all  question 
of  a  political  offence,  and  with  all  their  hypocritical  pretences  calcined 
by  the  heat  of  their  passion,  they  shout,  "  We  have  a  law,  and  by  our 
law  He  ought  to  die,  because  He  made  Himself  a  Son  of  God." 

A  Son  of  God !  The  notion  was  far  less  strange  and  repulsive  to  a 
heathen  than  to  a  Jew  ;  and  this  word,  unheard  before,  startled  Pilate 
with  the  third  omen,  which  made  nun  tremble  at  the  crime  into  which 
he  was  being  dragged  by  guilt  and  fear.  Once  more,  leaving  the 
yelling  multitude  without,  he  takes  Jesus  with  him  into  the  quiet 
Judgment  Hall,  and — "/am  pro  sua  conscientid  Ghristiamis,"  as  Ter- 
tullian  so  finely  observes — asks  Him  in  awe-struck  accents,  "  Whence 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  431 

art  thou  ?  "  Alas  !  it  was  too  late  to  answer  now.  Pilate  was  too 
deeply  committed  to  his  gross  cruelty  and  injustice  ;  for  him  Jesus  had 
spoken  enough  already ;  for  the  wild  beasts  who  raged  without,  He 
had  no  more  to  say.  He  did  not  answer.  Then,  almost  angrily,  Pilate 
broke  out  with  the  exclamation,  "  Dost  thou  not  speak  even  to  me  ? 
Dost  Thou  not  know  that  I  have  power  to  set  thee  free,  and  have 
power  to  crucify  Thee  ?  "  Power — how  so  ?  Was  justice  nothing, 
then?  truth  nothing?  innocence  nothing ?  conscience  nothing  ?  In  the 
reality  of  things  Pilate  had  no  such  power ;  even  in  the  arbitrary  sense 
of  the  tyrant  it  was  an  idle  boast,  for  at  this  very  moment  he  was 
letting  "I  dare  not"  wait  upon  "I  would."  And  Jesus  pitied  the 
hopeless  bewilderment  of  this  man,  whom  guilt  had  changed  from  a 
ruler  into  a  slave.  Not  taunting,  not  confuting  him — nay,  even 
extenuating  rather  than  aggravating  his  sin — Jesus  gently  answered, 
"  Thou  hast  no  power  against  Me  whatever,  had  it  not  been  given 
thee  from  above ;  therefore  he  that  betrayed  me  to  thee  hath  the 
greater  sin."  Thou  art  indeed  committing  a  great  crime;  but 
Judas,  Annas,  Caiaphas,  these  priests  and  Jews,  are  more  to  blame 
than  thou.  Thus,  with  infinite  dignity,  and  yet  with  infinite  tender- 
ness, did  Jesus  judge  His  judge.  In  the  very  depths  of  his  inmost 
soul  Pilate  felt  the  truth  of  the  words — silently  acknowledged  the 
superiority  of  his  bound  and  lacerated  victim.  All  that  remained  in 
him  of  human  and  of  noble — 

"  Felt  how  awf  al  Goodness  is,  and  Virtue, 
In  her  shape  how  lovely  ;  felt  and  mourned 
His  fall." 

All  of  his  soul  that  was  not  eaten  away  by  pride  and  cruelty  thrilled 
back  an  unwonted  echo  to  these  few  calm  words  of  the  Son  of  God. 
Jesus  had  condemned  his  sin,  and  so  far  from  being  offended,  the 
judgment  only  deepened  his  awe  of  this  mysterious  Being,  whose  utter 
impotence  seemed  grander  and  more  awful  than  the  loftiest  power. 
From  that  time  Pilate  was  even  yet  more  anxious  to  save  Him.  With 
all  his  conscience  in  a  tumult,  for  the  third  and  last  time  he  mounted 
his  tribunal,  and  made  one  more  desperate  effort.  He  led  Jesus 
forth,  and  looking  at  Him,  as  He  stood  silent  and  in  agony,  but 
calm,  on  that  shining  Gabbatha,  above  the  brutal  agitations  of  the 
multitude,  he  said  to  those  frantic  rioters,  as  with  a  flash  of  genuine 
conviction,  "  BEHOLD  YOUR  KING  ! "  But  to  the  Jews  it  sounded 
like  shameful  scorn  to  call  that  beaten  insulted  Sufferer  their  King. 
A  darker  stream  mingled  with  the  passions  of  the  raging,  swaying 


432  THE   LIFE    OF  CHEIS1. 

crowd.  Among  the  shouts  of  "  Crucify,"  ominous  threatenings  began 
for  the  first  time  to  be  mingled.  It  was  now  nine  o'clock,  and  for 
nearly  three  hours  had  they  been  raging  and  waiting  there.  The 
name  of  Caesar  began  to  be  heard  in  wrathful  murmurs.  "Shall 
I  crucify  your  King  ?  "  he  had  asked,  venting  the  rage  and  sore- 
ness of  his  heart  in  taunts  on  them.  "  We  have  no  king  but  Caesar," 
answered  the  Sadducees  and  Priests,  flinging  to  the  winds  every 
national  impulse  and  every  Messianic  hope.  "If  thou  let  this  man 
go,"  shouted  the  mob  again  and  again,  "  thou  art  not  Caesar's  friend- 
Every  one  who  tries  to  make  himself  a  king  speaketh  against  Ccesar." 
And  at  that  dark  terrible  name  of  Ceesar,  Pilate  trembled.  It  was 
a  name  to  conjure  with.  It  mastered  him.  He  thought  of  that 
terrible  implement  of  tyranny,  the  accusation  of  laesa  majcstas,  into 
which  all  other  charges  merged,  which  had  made  confiscation  and  tor- 
ture so  common,  and  had  caused  blood  to  flow  like  water  in  the  streets 
of  Borne.  He  thought  of  Tiberius,  the  aged  gloomy  Emperor,  then 
hiding  at  Caprere  his  ulcerous  features,  his  poisonous  suspicions,  his 
sick  infamies,  his  desperate  revenge.  At  this  very  time  he  had  been 
maddened  into  a  yet  more  sanguinary  and  misanthropic  ferocity  by 
the  detected  falsity  and  treason  of  his  only  friend  and  minister, 
Sejanus,  and  it  was  to  Sejanus  himself  that  Pilate  is  said  to  have 
owed  his  position.  There  might  be  secret  delators  in  that  very  mob. 
Panic-stricken,  the  unjust  judge,  in  obedience  to  his  own  terrors,  con- 
sciously betrayed  the  innocent  victim  to  the  anguish  of  death.  He 
who  had  so  often  prostituted  justice,  was  now  unable  to  achieve  the 
one  act  of  justice  which  he  desired.  He  who  had  so  often  murdered 
pity,  was  now  forbidden  to  taste  the  sweetness  of  a  pity  for  which  he 
longed.  He  who  had  so  often  abused  authority,  was  now  rendered 
impotent  to  exercise  it,  for  once,  on  the  side  of  right.  Truly  for  him, 
sin  had  become  its  own  Erinnys,  and  his  pleasant  vices  had  been  con- 
verted into  the  instrument  of  his  punishment !  Did  the  solemn  and 
noble  words  of  the  Law  of  the  Twelve  Tables — "  Vanae  voces  populi 
non  sunt  audiendae,  quando  aut  noxium  crimine  absolvi,  aut  innocentem 
condemnari  desiderant" — come  across  his  memory  with  accents  of 
reproach  as  he  delivered  Bar-Abbas  and  condemned  Jesus  ?  It  may 
have  been  so.  At  any  rate,  his  conscience  did  not  leave  him  at  ease. 
At  this,  or  some  early  period  of  the  trial,  he  went  through  the  solemn 
farce  of  trying  to  absolve  his  conscience  from  the  guilt.  He  sent  for 
water ;  he  washed  his  hands  before  the  multitude  !  he  said,  "  I  am 
innocent  of  the  blood  of  this  just  person  ;  see  ye  to  it."  Did  he  think 


THE   LIFE   OP   CHRIST.  433 

thus  to  wash  away  his  guilt  ?  He  could  wash  his  hands ;  could  he 
wash  his  heart  ?  Might  he  not  far  more  truly  have  said  with  the 
murderous  king  in  the  splendid  tragedy — 

"  Can  all  old  Ocean's  waters  wash  this  blood 
Clean  from  my  hand  ?     Nay,  rather  would  this  hand 
The  multitudinous  seas  incarnadine, 
Making  the  green — one  red  ! " 

It  may  be  that,  as  he  thus  murdered  his  conscience,  such  a  thought 
flashed  for  one  moment  across  his  miserable  mind,  in  the  words  of  his 

native  poet — 

"  Ah  niminm  faciles  qui  tristia  crimina  caedis 
Fliuninea  tolli  posse  putatis  aqua  ! "  OVID,  Fast.  ii.  45. 

But  if  so,  the  thought  was  instantly  drowned  in  a  yell,  the  most  awful, 
the  most  hideous,  the  most  memorable  that  History  records.  "  His 
blood  be  on  its  and  on  our  children."  Then  Pilate  finally  gave  way. 
The  fatal  "  Ibis  ad  crucein  "  was  uttered  with  reluctant  wrath.  He 
delivered  Him  unto  them,  that  He  might  be  crucified. 

And  now  mark,  for  one  moment,  the  revenges  of  History.  Has 
not  His  blood  been  on  them,  and  on  their  children  ?  Has  it  not  fallen 
most  of  all  on  those  most  nearly  concerned  in  that  deep  tragedy? 
Before  the  dread  sacrifice  was  consummated,  Judas  died  in  the  horrors 
of  a  loathsome  suicide.  Caiaphas  was  deposed  the  year  following. 
Herod  died  in  infamy  and  exile.  Stripped  of  his  Procuratorship  very 
shortly  afterwards,  on  the  very  charges  he  had  tried  by  a  wicked  con- 
cession to  avoid,  Pilate,  wearied  out  with  misfortunes,  died  in  suieide 
and  banishment,  leaving  behind  him  an  execrated  name.  The  house 
of  Annas  was  destroyed  a  generation  later  by  an  infuriated  mob,  and 
his  son  was  dragged  through  the  streets,  and  scourged  and  beaten  to 
his  place  of  murder.  Some  of  those  who  shared  in  and  witnessed 
the  scenes  of  that  day — and  thousands  of  their  children — also  shared 
in  and  witnessed  the  long  horrors  of  that  siege  of  Jerusalem  which 
stands  unparalleled  in  history  for  its  unutterable  fearfalness.  "  It 
seems,"  says  Renan,  "  as  though  the  whole  race  had  appointed  a 
rendezvous  for  extermination."  They  had  shouted,  "We  have  no 
king  but  Caesar ! "  and  they  had  no  king  but  Caesar ;  and  leaving  only 
for  a  time  the  fantastic  shadow  of  a  local  and  contemptible  loyalty, 
Caesar  after  Caesar  outraged,  and  tyrannised,  and  pillaged,  and  op- 
pressed them,  till  at  last  they  rose  in  wild  revolt  against  the  Caesar 
whom  they  had  claimed,  and  a  Caesar  slaked  in  the  blood  of  its  best 

2  F 


434  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

defenders  the  red  ashes  of  their  burnt  and  desecrated  Temple.  They 
had  forced  the  Romans  to  crncify  their  Christ,  and  though  they  re- 
garded this  punishment  with  especial  horror,  they  and  their  children 
were  themselves  crucified  in  myriads  by  the  Romans  outside  their  own 
walls,  till  room  was  wanting  and  wood  failed,  and  the  soldiers  had  to 
ransack  a  fertile  inventiveness  of  cruelty  for  fresh  methods  of  inflict- 
ing this  insulting  form  of  death.  They  had  given  thirty  pieces  of 
silver  for  their  Saviour's  blood,  and  they  were  themselves  sold  in 
thousands  for  yet  smaller  sums.  They  had  chosen  Bar- Abbas  in 
preference  to  their  Messiah,  and  for  them  there  has  been  no  Messiah 
more,  while  a  murderer's  dagger  swayed  the  last  counsels  of  their 
dying  nationality.  They  had  accepted  the  guilt  of  blood,  and 
the  last  pages  of  their  history  were  glued  together  with  the 
rivers  of  their  blood,  and  that  blood  continued  to  be  shed  in 
wanton  cruelties  from  age  to  age.  They  who  will,  may  see  in  inci- 
dents like  these  the  mere  unmeaning  chances  of  History ;  but  there  is 
in  History  nothing  unmeaning  to  one  who  regards  it  as  the  Voice  of 
God  speaking  among  the  destinies  of  men  ;  and  whether  a  man  sees 
any  significance  or  not  in  events  like  these,  he  must  be  blind  indeed 
who  does  not  see  that  when  the  murder  of  Christ  was  consummated* 
the  axe  was  laid  at  the  root  of  the  barren  tree  of  Jewish  nationality. 
Since  that  day  Jerusalem  and  its  environs,  with  their  "  ever- extending 
miles  of  grave-stones  and  ever-lengthening  pavement  of  tombs  and 
sepulchres,"  have  become  little  more  than  one  vast  cemetery — an 
Aceldama,  a  field  of  blood,  a  potter's  field  to  bury  strangers  in.  Like 
the  mark  of  Cain  upon  the  forehead  of  their  race,  the  guilt  of  that 
blood  has  seemed  to  cling  to  them — as  it  ever  must  until  thac  same 
blood  effaceth  it.  For,  by  God's  mercy,  that  blood  was  shed  for  them 
also  who  made  it  flow ;  the  voice  which  they  strove  to  quench  in  death 
was  uplifted  in  its  last  prayer  for  pity  on  His  murderers.  May  that 
blood  be  efficacious !  may  that  prayer  be  heard ! 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  435 

CHAPTER     LXI. 

THE   CRUCIFIXION. 

"I,  MILES,  EXPEDI  CRUCEM  "  (" Go,  soldier,  get  ready  the  cross").  In 
some  such  formula  of  terrible  import  Pilate  must  have  given  his  final 
order.  It  was  now  probably  about  nine  o'clock,  and  the  execution 
followed  immediately  upon  the  judgment.  The  time  required  for  the 
necessary  preparation  would  not  be  very  long,  and  during  this  brief 
pause  the  soldiers,  whose  duty  it  was  to  see  that  the  sentence  was 
carried  out,  stripped  Jesus  of  the  scarlet  war- cloak,  now  dyed  with  the 
yet  deeper  stains  of  blood,  and  clad  Him  again  in  His  own  garments. 
When  the  cross  had  been  prepared  they  laid  it — or  possibly  only  one 
of  the  beams  of  it — upon  His  shoulders,  and  led  Him  to  the  place  of 
punishment.  The  nearness  of  the  great  feast,  the  myriads  who  were 
present  in  Jerusalem,  made  it  desirable  to  seize  the  opportunity  for 
striking  terror  into  all  Jewish  malefactors.  Two  were  therefore 
selected  for  execution  at  the  same  time  with  Jesus — two  brigands  and 
rebels  of  the  lowest  stamp.  Their  crosses  were  laid  upon  them,  a 
maniple  of  soldiers  in  full  armour  were  marshalled  under  the  command 
of  their  centurion,  and,  amid  thousands  of  spectators,  coldly  inquisitive 
or  furiously  hostile,  the  procession  started  on  its  way. 

The  cross  was  not,  and  could  not  have  been,  the  massive  and  lofty 
structure  with  which  such  myriads  of  pictures  have  made  us  familiar. 
Crucifixion  was  among  the  Romans  a  very  common  punishment,  and 
it  is  clear  that  they  would  not  waste  any  trouble  in  constructing  the 
instrument  of  shame  and  torture.  It  would  undoubtedly  be  made  of 
the  very  commonest  wood  that  came  to  hand,  perhaps  olive  or  syca- 
more, and  knocked  together  in  the  very  rudest  fashion.  Still,  to 
support  the  body  of  a  man,  a  cross  would  require  to  be  of  a  certain 
size  and  weight ;  and  to  one  enfeebled  by  the  horrible  severity  of  the 
previous  scourging,  the  carrying  of  such  a  burden  would  be  an  addi- 
tional misery.  But  Jesus  was  enfeebled  not  only  by  this  cruelty,  but 
by  previous  days  of  violent  struggle  and  agitation,  by  an  evening  of 
deep  and  overwhelming  emotion,  by  a  night  of  sleepless  anxiety  and 
suffering,  by  the  mental  agony  of  the  garden,  by  three  trials  and  three 
sentences  of  death  before  the  Jews,  by  the  long  and  exhausting  scenes 
in  the  Praetorium,  by  the  examination  before  Herod,  and  by  the  brutal 
and  painful  derisions  which  He  had  undergone,  first  at  the  hands  of 

2  F  2 


436  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

the  Sanhedrin  and  their  servants,  then  from  Herod's  body-guard,  and 
lastly  from  the  Roman  cohort.  All  these,  superadded  to  the  sickening 
lacerations  of  the  scourging,  had  utterly  broken  down  His  physical 
strength.  His  tottering  footsteps,  if  not  His  actual  falls  under  that 
fearful  load,  made  it  evident  that  He  lacked  the  physical  strength  to 
carry  it  from  the  Praetorium  to  Golgotha.  Even  if  they  did  not  pity 
His  feebleness,  the  Roman  soldiers  would  naturally  object  to  the  con- 
sequent hindrance  and  delay.  But  they  found  an  easy  method  to  solve 
the  difficulty.  They  had  not  proceeded  farther  than  the  city  gate> 
when  they  met  a  man  coming  from  the  country,  who  was  known  to 
the  early  Christians  as  "Simon  of  Cyrene,  the  father  of  Alexander 
and  Rufus  ;"  and,  perhaps  on  some  hint  from  the  accompanying  Jews 
that  Simon  sympathised  with  the  teaching  of  the  Sufferer,  they 
impressed  him  without  the  least  scruple  into  their  odious  service. 

The  miserable  procession  resumed  its  course,  and  though  the 
apocryphal  traditions  of  the  Romish  Church  narrate  many  incidents  of 
the  Via  Dolorosa,  only  one  such  incident  is  recorded  in  the  Gospel 
history.  St.  Luke  tells  us  that  among  the  vast  multitude  of  people 
who  followed  Jesus  were  many  women.  From  the  men  in  that  moving 
crowd  He  does  not  appear  to  have  received  one  word  of  pity  or  of 
sympathy.  Some  there  must  surely  have  been  who  had  seen  His 
miracles,  who  had  heard  His  words ;  some  of  those  who  had  been 
almost,  if  not  utterly,  convinced  of  His  Messiahship  as  they  hung 
upon  His  lips  while  He  had  uttered  His  great  discourses  in  the 
Temple ;  some  of  the  eager  crowd  who  had  accompanied  Him  from 
Bethlehem  five  days  before  with  shouted  hosannas  and  waving  palms. 
Yet  if  so,  a  faithless  timidity  or  a  deep  misgiving — perhaps  even  a 
boundless  sorrow — kept  them  dumb.  But  these  women,  more  quick 
to  pity,  less  susceptible  to  controlling  influences,  could  not  and  would 
not  conceal  the  grief  and  amazement  with  which  this  spectacle  filled 
them.  They  beat  upon  their  breasts  and  rent  the  air  with  their 
lamentations,  till  Jesus  Himself  hushed  their  shrill  cries  with  words 
of  solemn  warning.  Turning  to  them — which  He  could  not  have 
done  had  He  still  been  staggering  under  the  burden  of  His  cross — 
He  said  to  them,  "Daughters  of  Jerusalem,  weep  not  for  me;  but 
for  yourselves  weep,  and  for  your  children.  For  lo  !  days  are  coming 
in  which  they  shall  say,  Blessed  are  the  barren,  and  the  wombs  which 
bare  not,  and  the  breasts  which  gave  not  suck.  Then  shall  they 
begin  to  say  to  the  mountains,  Fall  on  us,  and  to  the  hills,  Cover 
us ;  for  if  they  do  these  things  in  the  green  tree,  what  shall  be  done 


THE    LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  437 

in  the  dry  ?  "  Theirs  was  but  an  emotional  outburst  of  womanly 
tenderness,  which  they  could  not  repress  as  they  saw  the  great  Pro- 
phet of  mankind  in  His  hour  of  shame  and  weakness,  with  the  herald 
proclaiming  before  Him  the  crimes  with  which  He  was  charged,  and 
the  Roman  soldiers  carrying  the  title  of  derision,  and  Simon  bending 
under  the  weight  of  the  wood  to  which  He  was  to  be  nailed.  But 
He  warned  them  that,  if  this  were  all  which  they  saw  in  the  passing 
spectacle,  far  bitterer  causes  of  woe  awaited  them,  and  their  children, 
and  their  race.  Many  of  them,  and  the  majority  of  their  children,  would 
live  to  see  such  rivers  of  bloodshed,  such  complications  of  agony,  as 
the  world  had  never  known  before — days  which  would  seem  to  over- 
pass the  capacities  of  human  suffering,  and  would  make  men  seek  to 
hide  themselves,  if  it  might  be,  under  the  very  roots  of  the  hill  on 
which  their  city  stood.  The  fig-tree  of  their  nation's  life  was  still 
green :  if  such  deeds  of  darkness  were  possible  note,  what  should  be 
done  when  that  tree  was  withered  and  blasted,  and  ready  for  the 
burning? — if  in  the  days  of  hope  and  decency  they  could  execrate 
their  blameless  Deliverer,  what  would  happen  in  the  days  of  blasphemy 
and  madness  and  despair  ?  If,  under  the  full  light  of  day,  Priests  and 
Scribes  could  crucify  the  Innocent,  what  would  be  done  in  the  mid- 
night orgies  and  blood-stained  bacchanalia  of  zealots  and  murderers  ? 
This  was  a  day  of  crime ;  that  would  be  a  day  when  Crime  had 
become  her  own  avenging  fury. — The  solemn  warning,  the  last  sermon 
of  Christ  on  earth,  was  meant  primarily  for  those  who  heard  it ;  but, 
like  all  the  words  of  Christ,  it  has  deeper  and  wider  meaning  for  all 
mankind.  Those  words  warn  every  child  of  man  that  the  day  of 
careless  pleasure  and  blasphemous  disbelief  will  be  followed  by  the 
crack  of  doom ;  they  warn  each  human  being  who  lives  in  pleasure  on 
the  earth,  and  eats,  and  drinks,  and  is  drunken,  that  though  the 
patience  of  God  waits,  and  His  silence  is  unbroken,  yet  the  days  shall 
come  when  He  shall  speak  in  thunder,  and  His  wrath  shall  burn  like 
fire. 

And  so  with  this  sole  sad  episode,  they  came  to  the  fatal  place, 
called  Golgotha,  or,  in  its  Latin  form,  Calvary — that  is,  "a  skull." 
Why  it  was  so  called  is  not  known.  It  may  conceivably  have  been  a 
well-known  place  of  execution  ;  or  possibly  the  name  may  imply  a 
bare,  rounded,  scalp-like  elevation.  It  is  constantly  called  the  "hill 
of  Golgotha,"  or  of  Calvary;  but  the  Gospels  merely  call  it  "a  place," 
and  not  a  hill  (Matt,  xxvii.  33 ;  Mark  xv.  22).  Respecting  its  site 
volumes  have  been  written,  but  nothing  is  known.  The  data  for 


438  THE   LIFE   OF   CHKIST. 

anything  approaching  to  certainty  are  wholly  wanting;  and,  in  all 
probability,  the  actual  spot  lies  buried  and  obliterated  under  the 
mountainous  rubbish-heaps  of  the  ten-times-taken  city.  The  rugged 
and  precipitous  mountain  represented  in  sacred  pictures  is  as  purely 
imaginary  as  the  skull  of  Adam,  which  is  often  painted  lying  at  the 
foot  of  the  cross,  or  as  any  other  of  the  myriad  of  legends,  which  have 
gathered  round  this  most  stupendous  and  moving  scene  in  the  world's 
history.  All  that  we  know  of  Golgotha,  all  that  we  shall  ever  know, 
all  that  God  willed  to  be  known,  is  that  it  was  without  the  city  gate. 
The  religion  of  Christ  is  spiritual ;  it  needs  no  relic  ;  it  is  independent 
of  Holy  Places ;  it  says  to  each  of  its  children,  not  "  Lo,  here  !  "  and 
"  Lo,  there  !  "  but  "  The  kingdom  of  God  is  within  you." 

Utterly  brutal  and  revolting  as  was  the  punishment  of  crucifixion, 
which  has  now  for  fifteen  hundred  years  been  abolished  by  the  common 
pity  and  abhorrence  of  mankind,  there  was  one  custom  in  Judaea,  and 
one  occasionally  practised  by  the  Romans,  which  reveals  some  touch  of 
passing  humanity.  The  latter  consisted  in  giving  to  the  sufferer  a 
blow  under  the  arm-pit,  which,  without  causing  death,  yet  hastened 
its  approach.  Of  this  I  need  not  speak,  because,  for  whatever  reason, 
it  was  not  practised  on  this  occasion.  The  former,  which  seems  to 
have  been  due  to  the  milder  nature  of  Judaism,  and  which  was 
derived  from  a  happy  piece  of  Rabbinic  exegesis  on  Prov.  xxxi.  6, 
consisted  in  giving  to  the  condemned,  immediately  before  his  execu- 
tion, a  draught  of  wine  medicated  with  some  powerful  opiate.  It  had 
been  the  custom  of  wealthy  ladies  in  Jerusalem  to  provide  this  stupefy- 
ing potion  at  their  own  expense,  and  they  did  so  quite  irrespectively  of 
their  sympathy  for  any  individual  criminal.  It  was  probably  taken 
freely  by  the  two  malefactors,  but  when  they  offered  it  to  Jesus  Ho 
would  not  take  it.  The  refusal  was  an  act  of  sublimest  heroism.  The 
effect  of  the  draught  was  to  dull  the  nerves,  to  cloud  the  intellect,  to 
provide  an  anaesthetic  against  some  part,  at  least,  of  the  lingering 
agonies  of  that  dreadful  death.  But  He,  whom  some  modern  sceptics 
have  been  base  enough  to  accuse  of  feminine  feebleness  and  cowardly 
despair,  preferred  rather  "  to  look  Death  in  the  face  " — to  .meet  the 
King  of  Terrors  without  striving  to  deaden  the  force  of  one  agonising 
anticipation,  or  to  still  the  throbbing  of  one  lacerated  nerve. 

The  three  crosses  were  laid  on  the  ground — thab  of  Jesus,  which 
was  doubtless  taller  than  the  other  two,  being  placed  in  bitter  scorn  in 
the  midst.  Perhaps  the  cross-beam  was  now  nailed  to  the  upright,  and 
certainly  the  title,  which  had  either  been  borne  by  Jesua  fastened 


TIIE    Llb'E    OF   CHRIST.  439 

round  His  neck,  or  carried  by  one  of  the  soldiers  in  front  of  Him, 
was  now  nailed  to  the  summit  of  His  cross.  Then  He  was  stripped 
naked  of  all  His  clothes,  and  then  followed  the  most  awful  moment  of 
all.  He  was  laid  down  upon  the  implement  of  torture.  His  arms 
were  stretched  along  the  cross-beams,  and  at  the  centre  of  the  open 
palms  the  point  of  a  huge  iron  nail  was  placed,  which,  by  the  blow  of 
a  mallet,  was  driven  home  into  the  wood.  Then  through  either  foot 
separately,  or  possibly  through  both  together  as  they  were  placed  one 
over  the  other,  another  huge  nail  tore  its  way  through  the  quivering 
flesh.  Whether  the  sufferer  was  also  bound  to  the  cross  we  do  not 
know ;  but,  to  prevent  the  hands  and  feet  being  torn  away  by  the 
weight  of  the  body,  which  could  not  "  rest  upon  nothing  but  four  great 
wounds,"  there  was,  about  the  centre  of  the  cross,  a  wooden  projection 
strong  enough  to  support,  at  least  in  part,  a  human  body  which  soon 
became  a  weight  of  agony. 

It  was  probably  at  this  moment  of  inconceivable  horror  that  the 
voice  of  the  Son  of  Man  was  heard  uplifted,  not  in  a  scream  of  natural 
agony  at  that  fearful  torture,  but  calmly  praying  in  Divine  compassion 
for  His  brutal  and  pitiless  murderers — aye,  and  for  all  who  in  their 
sinful  ignorance  crucify  Him  afresh  for  ever — "  FATHER,  FORGIVE  THEM, 

FOR  THEY  KNOW  NOT  WHAT  THEY  DO." 

And  then  the  accursed  tree — with  its  living  human  burden  hanging 
upon  it  in  helpless  agony,  and  suffering  fresh  tortures  as  every  move- 
ment irritated  the  fresh  rents  in  hands  and  feet — was  slowly  heaved 
up  by  strong  arms,  and  the  end  of  it  fixed  firmly  in  a  hole  dug  deep 
in  the  ground  for  that  purpose.  The  feet  were  but  a  little  raised  above 
the  earth.  The  victim  was  in  full  reach  of  every  hand  that  might 
choose  to  strike,  in  close  proximity  to  every  gesture  of  insult  and 
hatred.  He  might  hang  for  hours  to  be  abused,  outraged,  even  tor- 
tured by  the  ever-moving  multitude  who,  with  that  desire  to  see  what 
is  horrible  which  always  characterises  the  coarsest  hearts,  had  thronged 
to  gaze  upon  a  sight  which  should  rather  have  made  them  weep  tears 
of  blood. 

And  there,  in  tortures  which  grew  ever  more  insupportable,  ever 
more  maddening  as  time  flowed  on,  the  unhappy  victims  might  linger 
in  a  living  death  so  cruelly  intolerable,  that  often  they  were  driven  to 
entreat  and  implore  the  spectators,  or  the  executioners,  for  dear  pity's 
Bake,  to  put  an  end  to  anguish  too  awful  for  man  to  bear — conscious 
to  the  last,  and  often,  with  tears  of  abject  misery,  beseeching  from 
their  enemies  the  priceless  boon  of  death. 


440  THE    LIFE   OF   CHKIST. 

For  indeed  a  death  by  crucifixion  seems  to  include  all  that  pain 
and  death  can  have  of  horrible  and  ghastly — dizziness,  cramp,  thirst, 
starvation,  sleeplessness,  traumatic  fever,  tetanus,  publicity  of  shame, 
long  continuance  of  torment,  horror  of  anticipation,  mortification  of 
untended  wounds — all  intensified  just  up  to  the  point  at  which  they 
can  be  endured  at  all,  but  all  stopping  just  short  of  the  point  which 
would  give  to  the  sufferer  the  relief  of  unconsciousness.  The  un- 
natural position  made  every  movement  painful;  the  lacerated  veins 
and  crushed  tendons  throbbed  with  incessant  anguish;  the  wounds, 
inflamed  by  exposure,  gradually  gangrened ;  the  arteries — especially  of 
the  head  and  stomach — became  swollen  and  oppressed  with  sur- 
charged blood;  and  while  each  variety  of  misery  went  on  gradually 
increasing,  there  was  added  to  them  the  intolerable  pang  of  a  burning 
and  raging  thirst;  and  all  these  physical  complications  caused  an 
internal  excitement  and  anxiety,  which  made  the  prospect  of  death 
itself — of  death,  the  awful  unknown  enemy,  at  whose  approach  man 
usually  shudders  most — bear  the  aspect  of  a  delicious  and  exquisite 
release. 

Such  was  the  death  to  which  Christ  was  doomed ;  and  though  for 
Him  it  was  happily  shortened  by  all  that  He  had  previously  endured, 
yet  He  hung  from  soon  after  noon  until  nearly  sunset,  before  "He 
gave  up  His  soul  to  death." 

When  the  cross  was  uplifted,  the  leading  Jews,  for  the  first  time, 
prominently  noticed  the  deadly  insult  in  which  Pilate  had  vented  his 
indignation.  Before,  in  their  blind  rage,  they  had  imagined  that  the 
manner  of  His  crucifixion  was  an  insult  aimed  at  Jesus ;  but  now  that 
they  saw  Him  hanging  between  the  two  robbers,  on  a  cross  yet  loftier, 
it  suddenly  flashed  upon  them  that  it  was  a  public  scorn  inflicted  upon 
them.  For  on  the  white  wooden  tablet  smeared  with  gypsum,  which 
was  to  be  seen  so  conspicuously  over  the  head  of  Jesus  on  the  cross, 
ran,  in  black  letters,  an  inscription  in  the  three  civilised  languages  of 
the  ancient  world — the  three  languages  of  which  one  at  least  was 
certain  to  be  known  by  every  single  man  in  that  assembled  multitude 
— in  the  official  Latin,  in  the  current  Greek,  in  the  vernacular 
Aramaic — informing  all  that  this  Man  who  was  thus  enduring  a 
shameful,  servile  death — this  Man  thus  crucified  between  two  sicarii 
in  the  sight  of  the  world,  was 

"THE  KING  OF  THE  JEWS." 

To  Him  who  was  crucified  the  poor  malice  seemed  to  have  in  it 
nothing  of  derision.  Even  on  His  cross  He  reigned ;  even  there  He 


THE    LIFB    OF   CHIIIST.  441 

Beemed  divinely  elevated  above  the  priests  who  had  bronght  about  His 
death,  and  the  coarse,  idle,  vulgar  multitude  who  had  flocked  to  feed 
their  greedy  eyes  upon  His  sufferings.  The  malice  was  quite  impotent 
against  One  whose  spiritual  and  moral  nobleness  struck  awe  into 
dying  malefactors  and  heathen  executioners,  even  in  the  lowest  abyss 
of  His  physical  degradation.  With  the  passionate  ill -humour  of  the 
Roman  governor  there  probably  blended  a  vein  of  seriousness.  While 
he  was  delighted  to  revenge  himself  on  his  detested  subjects  by  an  act 
of  public  insolence,  he  probably  meant,  or  half  meant,  to  imply  that 
this  loos,  in  one  sense,  the  King  of  the  Jews — the  greatest,  the  noblest, 
the  truest  of  His  race — whom,  therefore,  His  race  had  crucified.  The 
King  was  not  unworthy  of  His  kingdom,  but  the  kingdom  of  the 
King.  There  was  something  loftier  even  than  royalty  in  the  glazing 
eyes  which  never  ceased  to  look  with  sorrow  on  the  City  of  Righteous- 
ness, which  had  now  become  a  city  of  murderers.  The  Jews  felt  the 
intensity  of  the  scorn  with  which  Pilate  had  treated  them.  It  so 
completely  poisoned  their  hour  of  triumph,  that  they  sent  their  chief 
priests  in  deputation,  begging  the  Governor  to  alter  the  obnoxious 
title.  "  Write  not,"  they  said,  " '  The  King  of  the  Jews,'  but  that 
'  He  said,  I  am  the  King  of  the  Jews.'  "  But  Pilate's  courage,  which 
had  oozed  away  so  rapidly  at  the  name  of  Caesar,  had  now  revived. 
He  was  glad  in  any  and  every  way  to  browbeat  and  thwart  the  men 
whose  seditious  clamour  had  forced  him  in  the  morning  to  act  against 
his  will.  Few  men  had  the  power  of  giving  expression  to  a  sovereign 
contempt  more  effectually  than  the  Romans.  Without  deigning  any 
justification  of  what  he  had  done,  Pilate  summarily  dismissed  these 
solemn  hierarchs  with  the  curt  and  contemptuous  reply,  "  What  I 
have  written,  I  have  written." 

In  order  to  prevent  the  possibility  of  any  rescue,  even  at  the  last 
moment — since  instances  had  been  known  of  men  taken  from  the  cross 
and  restored  to  life — a  quaternion  of  soldiers  with  their  centurion  were 
left  on  the  ground  to  guard  the  cross.  The  clothes  of  the  victims 
always  fell  as  perquisites  to  the  men  who  had  to  perform  so  weary 
and  disagreeable  an  office.  Little  dreaming  how  exactly  they  were 
fulfilling  the  mystic  intimations  of  olden  Jewish  prophecy,  they  pro- 
ceeded, therefore,  to  divide  between  them  the  garments  of  Jesus. 
The  tallilh  they  tore  into  four  parts,  probably  ripping  it  down  the 
seams  (Dent.  xxii.  12);  but  the  cetoneth,  or  under  garment,  was  formed 
of  one  continuous  woven  texture,  and  to  tear  would  have  been  to  spoil 
it;  they  therefore  contented  themselves  with  letting  it  become  the 


442  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

property  of  any  one  of  the  four  to  whom  it  should  fall  by  lot.  When 
this  had  been  decided,  they  sat  down  and  watched  Him  till  the  end, 
beguiling  the  weary  lingering  hours  by  eating  and  drinking,  and 
gibing,  and  playing  dice. 

It  was  a  scene  of  tumult.  The  great  body  of  the  people  seem  to 
have  stood  silently  at  gaze ;  but  some  few  of  them  as  they  passed  by 
the  cross — perhaps  some  of  the  many  false  witnesses  and  other  con- 
spirators of  the  previous  night — mocked  at  Jesus  with  insulting  noises 
and  furious  taunts,  especially  bidding  Him  come  down  from  the  cross 
and  save  Himself,  since  He  could  destroy  the  Temple  and  build  it  in 
three  days.  And  the  chief  priests,  and  scribes,  and  elders,  less  awe- 
struck, less  compassionate  than  the  mass  of  the  people,  were  not 
ashamed  to  disgrace  their  grey-haired  dignity  and  lofty  reputation  by 
adding  their  heartless  reproaches  to  those  of  the  evil  few.  Unrestrained 
by  the  noble  patience  of  the  Sufferer,  tmsated  by  the  accomplishment 
of  their  wicked  vengeance,  unmoved  by  the  sight  of  helpless  anguish 
and  the  look  of  eyes  that  began  to  glaze  in  death,  they  congratulated 
one  another  under  His  cross  with  scornful  insolence — "  He  saved 
others,  Himself  He  cannot  save."  "Let  this  Christ,  this  King  of 
Israel,  descend  now  from  the  cross,  that  we  may  see  and  believe."  No 
wonder  then  that  the  ignorant  soldiers  took  their  share  of  mockery 
with  these  shameless  and  unvenerable  hierarchs :  no  wonder  that,  at 
their  midday  meal,  they  pledged  in  mock  hilarity  the  Dying  Man, 
cruelly  holding  up  towards  His  burning  lips  their  cups  of  sour  wine, 
and  echoing  the  Jewish  taunts  against  the  weakness  of  the  King 
whose  throne  was  a  cross,  whose  crown  was  thorns.  Nay,  even  the 
poor  wretches  who  were  crucified  with  Him  caught  the  hideous 
infection ;  comrades,  perhaps,  of  the  respited  Bar- Abbas — heirs  of  the 
rebellious  fury  of  a  Judas  the  Graulonite — trained  to  recognise  no 
Messiah  but  a  Messiah  of  the  sword,  they  reproachfully  bade  Him,  if 
His  claims  were  true,  to  save  Himself  and  them.  So  all  the  voices 
about  Him  rang  with  blasphemy  and  spite,  and  in  that  long  slow 
agony  His  dying  ear  caught  no  accent  of  gratitude,  of  pity,  or  of  love. 
Baseness,  falsehood,  savagery,  stupidity — such  were  the  characteristics 
of  the  world  which  thrust  itself  into  hideous  prominence  before  the 
Saviour's  last  consciousness — such  the  muddy  and  miserable  stream 
that  rolled  under  the  cross  before  His  dying  eyes. 

But  amid  this  chorus  of  infamy  Jesus  spoke  not.  He  could  have 
spoken.  The  pains  of  crucifixion  did  not  confuse  the  intellect,  or 
paralyse  the  powers  of  speech.  We  read  of  crucified  men  who,  for 


1UE    LIKE    OF   CHIilST.  443 

hours  together  upon  the  cross,  vented  their  sorrow,  their  rage,  or  their 
despair  in  the  manner  that  best  accorded  with  their  character;  of 
some  who  raved  and  cursed,  and  spat  at  their  enemies  ;  of  others  who 
protested  to  the  last  against  the  iniquity  of  their  sentence ;  of  others  who 
implored  compassion  with  abject  entreaties;  of  one  even  who,  from 
the  cross,  as  from  a  tribunal,  harrangued  the  multitude  of  his  country- 
men, and  upbraided  them  with  their  wickedness  and  vice.  But,  except 
to  bless  and  to  encourage,  and  to  add  to  the  happiness  and  hope  of 
others,  Jesus  spoke  not.  So  far  as  the  malice  of  the  passers-by,  and 
of  priests  and  Sanhedrists,  and  soldiers,  and  of  these  poor  robbers,  who 
suffered  with  Him,  was  concerned — as  before  during  the  trial  so  now 
upon  the  cross — He  maintained  unbroken  His  kingly  silence. 

Bat  that  silence,  joined  to  His  patient  majesty  and  the  divine 
holiness  and  innocence  which  radiated  from  Him  like  a  halo,  was  more 
eloquent  than  any  words.  It  told  earliest  on  one  of  the  crucified 
robbers.  At  first  this  "  bonus  latro  "  of  the  Apocryphal  Gospel  seems 
to  have  faintly  joined  in  the  reproaches  uttered  by  his  fellow-sinner ; 
but  when  those  reproaches  merged  into  deeper  blasphemy,  he  spoke 
out  his  inmost  thought.  It  is  probable  that  he  had  met  Jesus  before, 
and  heard  Him,  and  perhaps  been  one  of  those  thousands  who  had 
seen  His  miracles.  There  is  indeed  no  authority  for  the  legend  which 
assigns  to  him  the  name  of  Dysmas,  or  for  the  beautiful  story  of  his 
having  saved  the  life  of  the  Virgin  and  her  Child  during  their  flight 
into  Egypt.  But  on  the  plains  of  Gennesareth,  perhaps  from  some 
robber's  cave  in  the  wild  ravines  of  the  Valley  of  the  Doves,  he  may 
well  have  approached  His  presence — he  may  well  have  been  one  of 
those  publicans  and  sinners  who  drew  near  to  Him  for  to  hear  Him. 
And  the  words  of  Jesus  had  found  some  room  in  the  good  ground  of 
his  heart;  they  had  not  all  fallen  upon  stony  places.  Even  at  this 
hour  of  shame  and  death,  when  he  was  suffering  the  just  consequence 
of  his  past  evil  deeds,  faith  triumphed.  As  a  flame  sometimes  leaps 
up  among  dying  embers,  so  amid  the  white  ashes  of  a  sinful  life  which 
lay  so  thick  upon  his  heart,  the  flame  of  love  towards  his  God  and  his 
Saviour  was  not  quite-quenched.  Under  the  hellish  outcries  which  had 
broken  loose  around  the  cross  of  Jesus,  there  had  lain  a  deep  misgiving. 
Half  of  them  seem  to  have  been  instigated  by  doubt  and  fear.  Even  in  the 
self-congratulations  of  the  priests  we  catch  an  undertone  of  dread.  Sup- 
pose that  even  now  some  imposing  miracle  should  be  wrought  ?  Suppose 
that  even  now  that  martyr-form  should  burst  indeed  into  Messianic 
splendour,  and  the  King,  who  seemed  to  be  in  the  slow  misery  of  death, 


444  THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST. 

should  suddenly  with  a  great  voice  summon  His  legions  of  angels,  and 
springing  from  His  cross  upon  the  rolling  clouds  of  heaven,  come  in 
flaming  fire  to  take  vengeance  upon  His  enemies  ?  And  the  air  seemed 
to  be  full  of  signs.  There  was  a  gloom  of  gathering  darkness  in  the 
sky,  a  thrill  and  tremor  in  the  solid  earth,  a  haunting  presence  as  of 
ghostly  visitants  who  chilled  the  heart  and  hovered  in  awful  witness 
above  that  scene.  The  dying  robber  had  joined  at  first  in  the  half- 
taunting,  half-despairing  appeal  to  a  defeat  and  weakness  which  con- 
tradicted all  that  he  had  hoped ;  but  now  this  defeat  seemed  to  be 
greater  than  victory,  and  this  weakness  more  irresistible  than  strength. 
As  he  looked,  the  faith  in  his  heart  dawned  more  and  more  into  the 
perfect  day.  He  had  long  ceased  to  utter  any  reproachful  words  ;  he 
now  rebuked  his  comrade's  blasphemies.  Ought  not  the  suffering 
innocence  of  Him  who  hung  between  them,  to  shame  into  silence 
their  just  punishment  and  flagrant  guilt  ?  And  so,  turning  his  head 
to  Jesus,  he  uttered  the  intense  appeal,  "  0  Jesus,  remember  me  when 
Thou  comest  in  Thy  kingdom."  Then  He,  who  had  been  mute  amid 
invectives,  spake  at  once  in  surpassing  answer  to  that  humble  prayer, 
"VERILY,  I  SAT  TO  THEE,  TO-DAY  SHALT  THOU  BE  WITH  ME  IN  PARADISE." 

Though  none  spoke  to  comfort  Jesus — though  deep  grief,  and 
terror,  and  amazement  kept  them  dumb — yet  there  were  hearts  amid 
the  crowd  that  beat  in  sympathy  with  the  awful  Sufferer.  At  a  dis- 
tance stood  a  number  of  women  looking  on,  and  perhaps,  even  at  that 
dread  hour,  expecting  His  immediate  deliverance.  Many  of  these  were 
women  who  had  ministered  to  Him  in  Galilee,  and  had  come  from 
thence  in  the  great  band  of  Galileean  pilgrims.  Conspicuous  among 
this  heart-stricken  group  were  His  mother  Mary,  Mary  of  Magdala, 
Mary  the  wife  of  Clopas,  mother  of  James  and  Joses,  and  Salome  the 
wife  of  Zebedee.  Some  of  them,  as  the  hours  advanced,  stole  nearer 
and  nearer  to  the  cross,  and  at  length  the  filming  eye  of  the  Saviour 
fell  on  His  ow-n  mother  Maiy,  as,  with  the  sword  piercing  through  and 
through  her  heart,  she  stood  with  the  disciple  whom  He  loved.  His 
mother  does  not  seem  to  have  been  much  with  Him  during  His 
ministry.  It  may  be  that  the  duties  and  cares  of  a  humble  home 
rendered  it  impossible.  At  any  rate,  the  only  occasions  on  which 
we  hear  of  her  are  occasions  when  she  is  with  His  brethren,  and 
is  joined  with  them  in  endeavouring  to  influence,  apart  from  His 
own  purposes  and  authority,  His  Messianic  course.  But  although  at 
the  very  beginning  of  His  ministry  He  had  gently  shown  her  that  the 
earthly  and  filial  relation  was  now  to  be  transcended  by  one  far  more 


THE    LIFE    OF    CHRIST.  445 

lofty  and  divine,  and  though  this  end  of  all  her  high  hopes  mast  have 
tried  her  faith  with  an  overwhelming  and  unspeakable  sorrow,  yet  she 
was  true  to  Him  in  this  supreme  hour  of  His  humiliation,  and  would 
have  done  for  Him  all  that  a  mother's  sympathy  and  love  can  do. 
NOT  had  He  for  a  moment  forgotten  her  who  had  bent  over  His 
infant  slumbers,  and  with  whom  He  had  shared  those  thirty  years  in 
the  cottage  at  Nazareth.  Tenderly  and  sadly  He  thought  of  the 
future  that  awaited  her  during  the  remaining  years  of  her  life  on 
earth,  troubled  as  they  must  be  by  the  tumults  and  persecutions  of 
a  struggling  and  nascent  faith.  After  His  resurrection  her  lot  was 
wholly  cast  among  His  Apostles,  and  the  Apostle  whom  He  loved  the 
most,  the  Apostle  who  was  nearest  to  Him  in  heart  and  life,  seemed 
the  fittest  to  take  care  of  her.  To  him,  therefore — to  John  whom  He 
had  loved  more  than  His  brethren — to  John  whose  head  had  leaned 
upon  His  breast  at  the  Last  Supper,  He  consigned  her  as  a  sacred 
charge.  "  WOMAN,"  He  said  to  her,  in  fewest  words,  but  in  words 
which  breathed  the  uttermost  spirit  of  tenderness,  "  BEHOLD  THT  SON  ;  " 
and  then  to  St.  John,  "BEHOLD  THY  MOTHER."  He  could  make  no 
gesture  with  those  pierced  hands,  but  He  could  bend  His  head.  They 
listened  in  speechless  emotion,  but  from  that  hour — perhaps  from  that 
very  moment — leading  her  away  from  a  spectacle  which  did  but 
torture  her  soul  with  unavailing  agony,  that  disciple  took  her  to 
his  own  home. 

It  was  now  noon,  and  at  the  Holy  City  the  sunshine  should  have 
been  burning  over  that  scene  of  horror  with  a  power  such  as  it  has  in 
the  full  depth  of  an  English  summer-time.  But  instead  of  this,  the 
face  of  the  heavens  was  black,  and  the  noonday  sun  was  "  turned  into 
darkness,"  on  "  this  great  and  terrible  day  of  the  Lord."  It  could 
have  been  no  darkness  of  any  natural  eclipse,  for  the  Paschal  moon 
was  at  the  full ;  but  it  was  one  of  those  "  signs  from  heaven  "  for  which, 
during  the  ministry  of  Jesus,  the  Pharisees  had  so  often  clamoured 
in  vain.  The  early  Fathers  appealed  to  Pagan  authorities  —  the 
historian  Phallus,  the  chronicler  Phlegon — for  such  a  darkness ;  but 
we  have  no  means  of  testing  the  accuracy  of  these  references,  and  it  is 
quite  possible  that  the  darkness  was  a  local  gloom  which  hung  densely 
over  the  guilty  city  and  its  immediate  neighbourhood.  But  whatever 
it  was,  it  clearly  filled  the  minds  of  all  who  beheld  it  with  yet  deeper 
misgiving.  The  taunts  and  jeers  of  the  Jewish  priesta  and  the  heathen 
soldiers  were  evidently  confined  to  the  earlier  hours  of  the  crucifixion. 
Its  later  stages  seem  to  have  thrilled  alike  the  guilty  and  the  innocent 


446  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

with  emotions  of  dread  and  horror.  Of  the  incidents  of  those  last 
three  hours  we  are  told  nothing,  and  that  awful  obscuration  of  the 
noonday  sun  may  well  have  overawed  every  heart  into  an  inaction 
respecting  which  there  was  nothing  to  relate.  What  Jesus  suffered 
then  for  us  men  and  our  salvation  we  cannot  know,  for  during  those 
three  hours  He  hung  upon  His  cross  in  silence  and  darkness  ;  or,  if  He 
spoke,  there  were  none  there  to  record  His  words.  But  towards  the 
close  of  that  time  His  anguish  culminated,  and — emptied  to  the  very 
uttermost  of  that  glory  which  He  had  since  the  world  began — drink- 
ing to  the  very  deepest  dregs  the  cup  of  humiliation  and  bitterness — 
enduring,  not  only  to  have  taken  upon  Him  the  form  of  a  servant,  but 
also  to  suffer  the  last  infamy  which  human  hatred  could  impose  on 
servile  helplessness — He  uttered  that  mysterious  cry,  of  which  the  full 
significance  will  never  be  fathomed  by  man — 

"ELi,  ELI,  LAMA  SABACHTHANI  ?  "  ("My  Grod,  my  God,  why  hast 
thou  forsaken  me  ?  ") 

In  those  words,  quoting  the  Psalm  in  which  the  early  Fathers 
rightly  saw  a  far-off  prophecy  of  the  whole  passion  of  Christ,  He 
borrowed  from  David's  utter  agony  the  expression  of  His  own.  In 
that  hour  He  was  alone.  Sinking  from  depth  to  depth  of  unfathom- 
able suffering,  until,  at  the  close  approach  of  a  death  which — because 
He  was  God,  and  yet  had  been  made  man — was  more  awful  to  Him 
than  it  could  ever  be  to  any  of  the  sons  of  men,  it  seemed  as  if  even 
His  Divine  Humanity  could  endure  no  more. 

Doubtless  the  voice  of  the  Sufferer — though  uttered  loudly  in  that 
paroxysm  of  an  emotion  which,  in  another,  would  almost  have  touched 
the  verge  of  despair — was  yet  rendered  more  uncertain  and  indistinct 
from  the  condition  of  exhaustion  in  which  He  hung ;  and  so,  amid  the 
darkness,  and  confused  noise,  ajad  dull  footsteps  of  the  moving  multi- 
tude, there  were  some  who  did  not  hear  what  He  had  said.  They  had 
caught  only  the  first  syllable,  and  said  to  one  another  that  He  had 
called  on  the  name  of  Elijah.  The  readiness  with  which  they  seized 
this  false  impression  is  another  proof  of  the  wild  state  of  excitement 
and  terror — the  involuntary  dread  of  something  great,  and  unforeseen, 
and  terrible — to  which  they  had  been  reduced  from  their  former  savage 
insolence.  For  Elijah,  the  great  prophet  of  the  Old  Covenant,  was 
inextricably  mingled  with  all  the  Jewish  expectations  of  a  Messiah, 
and  these  expectations  were  full  of  wrath.  The  coming  of  Elijah 
would  be  the  coming  of  a  day  of  fire,  in  which  the  sun  should  bo 
turned  into  blackness  and  the  moon  into  blood,  and  the  powers  of 


THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST.  447 

heaven  should  be  shaken.  Already  the  noonday  sun  was  shrouded  in 
unnatural  eclipse:  might  not  some  awful  form  at  any  moment  rend 
the  heavens  and  come  down,  touch  the  mountains  and  they  should 
smoke  ?  The  vague  anticipation  of  conscious  guilt  was  unfulfilled. 
Not  such  as  yet  was  to  be  the'  method  of  God's  workings.  His  mes- 
sages to  man  for  many  ages  more  were  not  to  be  in  the  thunder  and 
earthquake,  not  in  rushing  wind  or  roaring  flame,  but  in  the  "still 
small  voice  "  speaking  always  amid  the  apparent  silences  of  Time  in 
whispers  intelligible  to  man's  heart,  but  in  which  there  is  neither 
speech  nor  language,  though  the  voice  is  heard. 

But  now  the  end  was  very  rapidly  approaching,  and  Jesus,  who 
had  been  hanging  for  nearly  six  hours  upon  the  cross,  was  suffering 
from  that  torment  of  thirst  which  is  most  difficult  of  all  for  the  human 
frame  to  bear — perhaps  the  most  unmitigated  of  the  many  separate 
sources  of  anguish  which  were  combined  in  this  worst  form  of  death. 
No  doubt  this  burning  thirst  was  aggravated  by  seeing  the  Roman 
soldiers  drinking  so  near  the  cross  ;  and  happily  for  mankind,  Jesus 
had  never  sanctioned  the  unnatural  affectation  of  stoic  impassibility. 
And  so  He  uttered  the  one  sole  word  of  physical  suffering  which  had 
been  wrung  from  Hun  by  all  the  hours  in  which  He  had  endured 
the  extreme  of  all  that  man  can  inflict.  He  cried  aloud,  "  I  THIRST." 
Probably  a  few  hours  before,  the  cry  would  only  have  provoked  a  roar 
of  fi*antic  mockery ;  but  now  the  lookers-on  were  reduced  by  awe  to  a 
readier  humanity.  Near  the  cross  there  lay  on  the  ground  the  large 
earthen  vessel  containing  the  posca,  which  was  the  ordinary  drink  of 
the  Roman  soldiers.  The  mouth  of  it  was  filled  with  apiece  of  sponge, 
which  served  as  a  cork.  Instantly  some  one — we  know  not  whether 
he  was  friend  or  enemy,  or  merely  one  who  was  there  out  of  idle 
curiosity — took  out  the  sponge  and  dipped  it  in  the  posca  to  give  it  to 
Jesus.  But  low  as  was  the  elevation  of  the  cross,  the  head  of  the 
Sufferer,  as  it  rested  on  the  horizontal  beam  of  the  accursed  tree,  was 
just  beyond  the  man's  reach ;  and  therefore  he  put  the  sponge  at  the 
end  of  a  stalk  of  hyssop — about  a  foot  long — and  held  it  up  to  the 
parched  and  dying  lips.  Even  this  simple  act  of  pity,  which  Jesus 
did  not  refuse,  seemed  to  jar  upon  the  condition  of  nervous  excitement 
with  which  some  of  the  multitude  were  looking  on.  "  Let  be,"  they 
said  to  the  man,  "  let  us  see  whether  Elias  is  coming  to  save  Him." 
The  man  did  not  desist  from  his  act  of  mercy,  but  when  it  was  done 
he  too  seems  to  have  echoed  those  uneasy  words.  But  Elias  came  not, 
nor  human  comforter,  nor  angel  deliverer.  It  was  the  will  of  God,  it 


418  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

was  the  will  of  the  Son  of  God,  that  He  should  be  "  perfected  through 
sufferings ;" — that — for  the  eternal  example  of  all  His  children  as  long 
as  the  world  should  last — He  should  "  endure  unto  the  end." 

And  now  the  end  was  come.  Once  more,  in  the  words  of  the 
sweet  Psalmist  of  Israel  (Psa.  xxxi.  5),  but  adding  to  them  that  title  of 
trustful  love  which,  through  Him,  is  permitted  to  the  use  of  all  man- 
kind, "  FATHER,"  He  said,  "  INTO  THY  HANDS  I  COMMEND  MY  SPIRIT."  Then 
with  one  more  great  effort  He  uttered  the  last  cry — the  one  victorious 
word  (TereX,e<rraO>  "  IT  IS  FINISHED."  It  may  be  that  that  great  cry- 
ruptured  some  of  the  vessels  of  His  heart ;  for  no  sooner  had  it  been 
uttered  than  He  bowed  His  head  upon  His  breast,  and  yielded  His  life, 
"  a  ransom  for  many  " — a  willing  sacrifice  to  His  Heavenly  Father. 
"  Finished  was  His  holy  life ;  with  His  life  His  struggle,  with  His 
struggle  His  work,  with  His  work  the  redemption,  with  the  re- 
demption the  foundation  of  the  new  world."  At  that  moment  the 
vail  of  the  Temple  was  rent  in  twain  from  the  top  to  the  bottom. 
An  earthquake  shook  the  earth  and  split  the  rocks,  and  as  it  rolled 
away  from  their  places  the  great  stones  which  closed  and  covered  the 
cavern  sepulchres  of  the  Jews,  so  it  seemed  to  the  imaginations  of 
many  to  have  disimprisoned  the  spirits  of  the  dead,  and  to  have  filled 
the  air  with  ghostly  visitants,  who  after  Christ  had  risen  appeared  to 
linger  in  the  Holy  City.  These  circumstances  of  amazement,  joined 
to  all  they  had  observed  in  the  bearing  of  the  Crucified,  cowed  even 
the  cruel  and  gay  indifference  of  the  Roman  soldiers.  On  the  cen- 
turion, who  was  in  command  of  them,  the  whole  scene  had  exercised 
a  yet  deeper  influence.  As  he  stood  opposite  to  the  cross  and  saw  the 
Saviour  die,  he  glorified  God,  and  exclaimed,  "  This  Man  was  in  truth 
righteous" — nay,  more,  "This  Man  was  a  Son  of  God."  Even  the 
multitude,  utterly  sobered  from  their  furious  excitement  and  frantic 
rage,  began  to  be  weighed  down  with  a  guilty  consciousness  that  the 
scene  which  they  had  witnessed  had  in  it  something  more  awful  than 
they  could  have  conceived,  and  as  they  returned  to  Jerusalem  they 
wailed,  and  beat  upon  their  breasts.  Well  might  they  do  so  !  This 
was  the  last  drop  in  a  full  cup  of  wickedness :  this  was  the  beginning 
of  the  end  of  their  city,  and  name,  and  race. 

And  in  truth  that  scene  was  more  awful  than  they,  or  even  we 
can  know.  The  secular  historian,  be  he  ever  so  sceptical,  cannot  fail 
to  see  in  it  the  central  point  of  the  world's  history.  Whether  he  be  a 
believer  in  Christ  or  not,  he  cannot  refuse  to  admit  that  this  new 
religion  grew  from  the  smallest  of  all  seeds  to  be  a  mighty  tree,  so 


THB   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  449 

that  the  birds  of  the  air  took  refuge  in  its  branches ;  that  it  was  the 
little  stone  cut  without  hands  which  dashed  into  pieces  the  colossal 
image  of  heathen  greatness,  and  grew  till  it  became  a  great  mountain 
and  filled  the  earth.  Alike  to  the  infidel  and  to  the  believer  the 
crucifixion  is  the  boundary  instant  between  ancient  and  modern  days. 
Morally  and  physically,  no  less  than  spiritually,  the  Faith  of  Christ 
was  the  Palingenesia  of  the  world.  It  came  like  the  dawn  of  a  new 
spring  to  nations  "effete  with  the  drunkenness  of  crime."  The 
struggle  was  long  and  hard,  but  from  the  hour  when  Christ  died 
began  the  death-knell  to  every  Satanic  tyranny  and  every  tolerated 
abomination.  From  that  hour  Holiness  became  the  universal  ideal 
of  all  who  name  the  name  of  Christ  as  their  Lord,  and  the  attain- 
ment of  that  ideal  the  common  heritage  of  souls  in  which  His  Spirit 
dwells. 

The  effects,  then,  of  the  work  of  Christ  are  even  to  the  unbeliever 
indisputable  and  historical.  It  expelled  cruelty ;  it  curbed  passion ; 
it  branded  suicide;  it  punished  and  repressed  an  execrable  infanticide ; 
it  drove  the  shameless  impurities  of  heathendom  into  a  congenial 
darkness.  There  was  hardly  a  class  whose  wrongs  it  did  not  remedy. 
It  rescued  the  gladiator ;  it  freed  the  slave ;  it  protected  the  captive ; 
it  nursed  the  sick ;  it  sheltered  the  orphan  ;  it  elevated  the  woman ;  it 
shrouded  as  with  a  halo  of  sacred  innocence  the  tender  years  of  the 
child.  In  every  region  of  life  its  ameliorating  influence  was  felt.  It 
changed  pity  from  a  vice  into  a  virtue.  It  elevated  poverty  from  a 
curse  into  a  beatitude.  It  ennobled  labour  from  a  vulgarity  into 
a  dignity  and  a  duty.  It  sanctified  marriage  from  little  more  than  a 
burdensome  convention  into  little  less  than  a  blessed  sacrament.  It 
revealed  for  the  first  time  the  angelic  beauty  of  a  Purity  of  which  men 
had  despaired  and  of  a  Meekness  at  which  they  had  utterly  scoffed. 
It  created  the  very  conception  of  charity,  and  broadened  the  limits  of 
its  obligation  from  the  narrow  circle  of  a  neighbourhood  to  the  widest 
horizons  of  the  race.  And  while  it  thus  evolved  the  idea  of  Humanity 
as  a  common  brotherhood,  even  where  its  tidings  were  not  believed — 
all  over  the  world,  wherever  its  tidings  were  believed,  it  cleansed  the 
life  and  elevated  the  soul  of  each  individual  man.  And  in  all  lands 
where  it  has  moulded  the  characters  of  its  true  believers,  it  has 
created  hearts  so  pure,  and  lives  so  peaceful,  and  homes  so  sweet,  that 
it  might  seem  as  though  those  angels  who  had  heralded  its  advent  had 
also  whispered  to  every  depressed  and  despairing  sufferer  among  the 
sons  of  men,  "  Though  ye  have  lien  among  the  pots,  yet  shall  ye  be  as 

2  a 


450  THE   LIFE    OF   CUBIST. 

the  wings  of  a  dove,  that  is  covered  with  silver  wings,  and  her  feathers 
like  gold." 

Others,  if  they  ccm  and  will,  may  see  in  such  a  work  as  this  no 
Divine  Providence ;  they  may  think  it  philosophical  enlightenment  to 
hold  that  Christianity  and  Christendom  are  adequately  accounted  for 
by  the  idle  dreams  of  a  noble  self -deceiver,  and  the  passionate  hallu- 
cinations of  a  recovered  demoniac.  We  persecute  them  not,  we 
denounce  them  not,  we  judge  them  not ;  but  we  say  that,  unless  all 
life  be  a  hollow,  there  could  have  been  no  such  miserable  origin  to  the 
sole  religion  of  the  world,  which  holds  the  perfect  balance  between 
philosophy  and  popularity,  between  religion  and  morals,  between  meek 
submissiveness  and  the  pride  of  freedom,  between  the  ideal  and  the 
real,  between  the  inward  and  the  outward,  between  modest  stillness 
and  heroic  energy,  nay,  between  the  tenderest  conservatism  and  the 
boldest  plans  of  world-wide  reformation.  The  witness  of  History  to 
Christ  is  a  witness  which  has  been  given  with  irresistible  cogency ; 
and  it  has  been  so  given  to  none  but  Him. 

But  while  even  the  unbeliever  must  see  what  the  life  and  death  of 
Jesus  have  effected  in  the  world,  to  the  believer  that  life  and  death  are 
something  deeper  still ;  to  him  they  are  nothing  less  than  a  resurrection 
from  the  dead.  He  sees  in  the  cross  of  Christ  something  which  far 
transcends  its  historical  significance.  He  sees  in  it  the  fulfilment  of 
all  prophecy  as  well  as  the  consummation  of  all  history ;  he  sees  in  it 
the  explanation  of  the  mystery  of  birth,  and  the  conquest  over  the 
mystery  of  the  grave.  In  that  life  he  finds  a  perfect  example ;  in  that 
death  an  infinite  redemption.  As  he  contemplates  the  Incarnation 
and  the  Crucifixion,  he  no  longer  feels  that  God  is  far  away,  and  that 
this  earth  is  bub  a  disregarded  speck  in  the  infinite  azure,  and  he 
himself  but  an  insignificant  atom  chance-thrown  amid  the  thousand 
million  living  souls  of  an  innumerable  race,  but  he  exclaims  in  faith 
;ind  hope  and  love,  "  Behold,  the  tabernacle  of  God  is  with  men ;  yea, 
He  will  be  their  God,  and  they  shall  be  His  people."  "Ye  are  the 
temple  of  the  living  God ;  as  God  hath  said,  I  will  dwell  in  them,  and 
walk  in  them  "  (Ezek.  xxxvii.  27 ;  2  Cor.  vi.  16). 

The  sun  was  westering  as  the  darkness  rolled  a  way  from  the  completed 
sacrifice.  They  who  had  not  thought  it  a  pollution  to  inaugurate  their 
feast  by  the  murder  of  their  Messiah,  were  seriously  alarmed  lest  the 
sanctity  of  the  following  day — which  began  at  sunset — should  be  com- 
promised by  the  hanging  of  the  corpses  on  the  cross.  And,  horrible 
to  relate,  the  crucified  often  lived  for  many  hours — nay,  even  for  two 


Tilt    LIFE    OF   C1IH1S1.  451 

days — in  their  torture.  The  Jews  therefore  begged  Pilate  that  their 
legs  might  be  broken,  and  their  bodies  taken  down.  This  crurifragium, 
as  it  was  called,  consisted  in  striking  the  legs  of  the  sufferers  with  a 
heavy  mallet,  a  violence  which  seemed  always  to  have  hastened,  if  it 
did  not  instantly  cause  their  death.  Nor  would  the  Jews  be  the  only 
persona  who  would  be  anxious  to  hasten  the  end  by  giving  the  deadly 
blow.  Until  life  was  extinct,  the  soldiers  appointed  to  guard  the 
execution  dared  not  leave  the  ground.  The  wish,  therefore,  was 
readily  granted.  The  soldiers  broke  the  legs  of  the  two  malefactors 
first,  and  then,  coming  to  Jesus,  found  that  the  great  cry  had  been 
indeed  His  last,  and  that  He  was  dead  already.  They  did  not,  there- 
fore, break  His  legs,  and  thus  unwittingly  preserved  the  symbolism  of 
that  Paschal  lamb,  of  which  He  was  the  antitype,  and  of  which  it  had 
been  commanded  that  "  a  bone  of  it  shall  not  be  broken  "  (Exod.  xii. 
46).  And  yet,  as  He  might  be  only  in  a  syncope — as  instances  had 
been  known  in  which  men  apparently  dead  had  been  taken  down  from 
the  cross  and  resuscitated — and  as  the  lives  of  the  soldiers  would  have 
had  to  answer  for  any  irregularity,  one  of  them,  in  order  to  make 
death  certain,  drove  the  broad  head  of  his  hasta  into  His  side.  The 
wound,  as  it  was  meant  to  do,  pierced  the  region  of  the  heart,  and 
"forthwith,"  says  St.  John,  with  an  emphatic  appeal  to  the  truthful- 
ness of  his  eye-witness  (an  appeal  which  would  be  singularly  and 
impossibly  blasphemous  if  the  narrative  were  the  forgery  which  so 
much  elaborate  modern  criticism  has  wholly  failed  to  prove  that  it  is)> 
"  forthwith  came  there  out  blood  and  water."  Whether  the  water 
was  due  to  some  abnormal  pathological  conditions  caused  by  the 
dreadful  complication  of  the  Saviour's  sufferings — or  whether  it  rather 
means  that  the  pericardium  had  been  rent  by  the  spear-point,  and  that 
those  who  took  down  the  body  observed  some  drops  of  its  serum 
mingled  with  the  blood — in  either  case  that  lance-thrust  was  sufficient 
to  hush  all  the  heretical  assertions  that  Jesus  had  only  seem-ed  to  die ; 
and  as  it  assured  the  soldiers,  so  should  it  assure  all  who  have  doubted, 
that  He,  who  on  the  third  day  rose  again,  had  in  truth  been  crucified, 
dead,  and  buried,  and  that  His  soul  had  passed  into  the  unseen  world. 


2  o  2 


452  THE   LIFE   OF  CHRIST. 

CHAPTER  LXII. 

THE      RESURRECTION. 

AT  the  moment  when  Christ  died,  nothing  could  have  seemed  more 
abjectly  weak,  more  pitifully  hopeless,  more  absolutely  doomed  to 
scorn,  and  extinction,  and  despair,  than  the  Church  which  He  had 
founded.  It  numbered  but  a  handful  of  weak  followers,  of  which  the 
boldest  had  denied  his  Lord  with  blasphemy,  and  the  most  devoted  had 
forsaken  Him  and  fled.  They  were  poor,  they  were  ignorant,  they 
were  hopeless.  They  could  not  claim  a  single  synagogue  or  a  single 
sword.  If  they  spoke  their  own  language,  it  bewrayed  them  by  its 
mongrel  dialect ;  if  they  spoke  the  current  Greek,  it  was  despised  as  a 
miserable  patois.  So  feeble  were  they  and  insignificant,  that  it  would 
have  looked  like  foolish  partiality  to  prophesy  for  them  the  limited 
existence  of  a  Galilaean  sect.  How  was  it  that  these  dull  and  ignorant 
men,  with  their  cross  of  wood,  triumphed  over  the  deadly  fascinations 
of  sensual  mythologies,  conquered  kings  and  their  armies,  and  overcame 
the  world  ? 

What  was -it  that  thus  caused  strength  to  be  made  perfect  out  of 
abject  weakness  ?  There  is  one,  and  one  only  possible  answer — the 
resurrection  from  the  dead.  All  this  vast  revolution  was  due  to  the 
power  of  Christ's  resurrection.  "  If  we  measure  what  seemed  to  be 
the  hopeless  ignominy  of  the  catastrophe  by  which  His  work  was 
ended,  and  the  Divine  prerogatives  which  are  claimed  for  Him,  not 
in  spite  of,  but  in  consequence  of  that  suffering  and  shame,  we  shall  feel 
the  utter  hopelessness  of  reconciling  the  fact,  and  that  triumphant 
deduction  from  it,  without  some  intervening  fact  as  certain  as  Christ's 
passion,  and  glorious  enough  to  transfigure  its  sorrow." 

The  sun  was  now  on  the  edge  of  the  horizon,  and  the  Sabbath  day 
was  near.  And  "that  Sabbath  day  was  a  high  day,"  a  Sabbath  of 
peculiar  splendour  and  solemnity,  because  it  was  at  once  a  Sabbath  and 
a  Passover  (John  xix.  31).  The  Jews  had  taken  every  precaution  to 
prevent  the  ceremonial  pollution  of  a  day  so  sacred,  and  were  anxious 
that  immediately  after  the  death  of  the  victims  had  been  secured,  their 
bodies  should  be  taken  from  the  cross.  About  the  sepulture  they  did 
not  trouble  themselves,  leaving  it  to  the  chance  good  offices  of  friends 
and  relatives  to  huddle  the  malefactors  into  their  nameless  graves. 
The  dead  body  of  Jesus  was  left  hanging  till  the  last,  because  a 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  453 

person  who  could  not  easily  be  slighted  had  gone  to  obtain  leave 
from  Pilate  to  dispose  of  it  as  he  wished. 

This  was  Joseph  of  Arimathrea,  a  rich  man,  of  high  character  and 
blameless  life,  and  a  distinguished  member  of  the  Sanhedrin.  Although 
timidity  of  disposition,  or  weakness  of  faith,  had  hitherto  prevented 
him  from  openly  declaring  his  belief  in  Jesus,  yet  he  had  abstained  from 
sharing  in  the  vote  of  the  Sanhedrin,  or  countenancing  their  crime. 
And  now  sorrow  and  indignation  inspired  him  with  courage.  Since  it 
was  too  late  to  declare  his  sympathy  for  Jesus  as  a  living  Prophet,  he 
would  at  least  give  a  sign  of  his  devotion  to  Him  as  the  martyred  victim 
of  a  wicked  conspiracy.  Flinging  secrecy  and  cautiou  to  the  winds, 
he  no  sooner  saw  that  the  cross  on  Golgotha  now  bore  a  lifeless 
burden,  than  he  went  to  Pilate  on  the  very  evening  of  the  crucifixion, 
and  begged  that  the  dead  body  might  be  given  him.  Although  the 
Romans  left  their  crucified  slaves  to  be  devoured  by  dogs  and  ravens, 
Pilate  had  no  difficulty  in  sanctioning  the  more  humane  and  reverent 
custom  of  the  Jews,  which  required,  even  in  extreme  cases,  the  burial 
of  the  dead  (Deut.  xxi.  23  ;  Josh.  viii.  29).  He  was,  however,  amazed 
at  the  speediness  with  which  death  had  supervened,  and  sending  for 
the  centurion,  asked  whether  it  had  taken  place  sufficiently  long  to 
distinguish  it  from  a  faint  or  swoon.  On  ascertaining  that  such  was 
the  fact,  he  at  once  assigned  the  body,  doubtless  witwtome  real  satis- 
faction, to  the  care  of  this  "honourable  councillor."  Without  wasting 
a  moment,  Joseph  purchased  a  long  piece  of  fine  linen,  and  took  the 
body  from  its  cross.  Meanwhile  the  force  of  his  example  had  helped 
to  waken  a  kindred  feeling  in  the  soul  of  the  candid  but  fearful 
Nicodemus.  If,  as  seems  extremely  probable,  he  be  identical  with  the 
Nakdimon  Ben  Gorion  of  the  Talmud,  he  was  a  man  of  enormous 
wealth ;  and  however  much  he  had  held  back  during  the  life  of  Jesus, 
now,  on  the  evening  of  His  death,  his  heart  was  filled  with  a  gush  of 
compassion  and  remorse,  and  he  hurried  to  His  cross  and  burial  with 
an  offering  of  truly  royal  munificence.  The  faith  which  had  once 
required  the  curtain  of  darkness,  can  now  venture  at  least  into  the 
light  of  sunset,  and  brightened  finally  into  noonday  confidence. 
Thanks  to  this  glow  of  kindling  sorrow  and  compassion  in  the  hearts 
of  these  two  noble  and  wealthy  disciples,  He  who  died  as  a  malefactor, 
was  buried  as  a  king.  "  He  made  His  grave  with  the  wicked,  and 
with  the  rich  in  His  death."  The  fine  linen  (sindori)  which  Joseph 
had  purchased  was  richly  spread  with  the  hundred  litras  of  myrrh  and 
perfumed  aloe-wood  which  Nicodemus  had  brought,  and  the  lacerated 


THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

body — whose  divinely-human  spirit  was  now  in  the  calm  of  its  sabbath 
rest  in  the  Paradise  of  God — was  thus  carried  to  its  loved  and  peaceful 
grave. 

Close  by  the  place  of  crucifixion — if  not  an  actual  part  of  it — was  a 
garden  belonging  to  Joseph  of  Arimathsea,  and  in  its  enclosure  he  had 
caused  a  new  tomb  to  be  hewn  for  himself  out  of  the  solid  rock,  that 
he  might  be  buried  in  the  near  precincts  of  the  Holy  City.  The  tomb 
had  never  been  used,  but,  in  spite  of  the  awful  sacredness  which  the 
Jews  attached  to  their  rock-hewn  sepulchres,  and  the  sensitive  scrupu- 
losity with  which  they  shrank  from  all  contact  with  a  corpse,  Joseph 
never  hesitated  to  give  up  for  the  body  of  Jesus  the  last  home  which 
he  had  designed  for  his  own  use.  But  the  preparations  had  to  be 
hurried,  because  when  the  sun  had  set  the  Sabbath  would  have  begun. 
All  that  they  could  do,  therefore,  was  to  wash  the  corpse,  to  lay  it 
amid  the  spices,  to  wrap  the  head  in  a  white  napkin,  to  roll  the  fine 
linen  round  and  round  the  wounded  limbs,  and  to  lay  the  body  reve- 
rently in  the  rocky  niche.  Then,  with  the  united  toil  of  several  men, 
they  rolled  a  golal,  or  great  stone,  to  the  horizontal  aperture ;  and 
scarcely  had  they  accomplished  this  when,  as  the  sun  sank  behind  the 
hills  of  Jerusalem,  the  new  Sabbath  dawned. 

Mary  of  Magdala,  and  Mary  the  mother  of  James  and  Joses,  had 
seated  themselves  in  the  garden  to  mark  well  the  place  of  sepulture, 
and  other  Galilsean  women  had  also  noticed  the  spot,  and  had  hurried 
home  to  prepare  fresh  spices  and  ointments  before  the  Sabbath  began, 
that  they  might  hasten  back  early  on  the  morning  of  Sunday,  and 
complete  that  embalming  of  the  body  which  Joseph  and  Nicodemus 
had  only  hastily  begun.  They  spent  in  quiet  that  miserable  Sabbath, 
which,  for  the  broken  hearts  of  all  who  loved  Jesus,  was  a  Sabbath  of 
anguish  and  despair. 

But  the  enemies  of  Christ  were  not  so  inactive.  The  awful  mis- 
giving of  guilty  consciences  was  not  removed  even  by  His  death  upon 
the  cross.  They  recalled,  with  dreadful  reminiscence,  the  rumoured  pro- 
phecies of  His  resurrection — the  sign  of  the  prophet  Jonah,  which  He 
had  said  would  alone  be  given  them  (Matt.  xii.  39) — the  great  utterance 
about  the  destroyed  Temple,  which  He  would  in  three  days  raise  up ; 
and  these  intimations,  which  were  but  dim  to  a  crushed  and  wavering 
faith,  were  read,  like  fiery  letters  upon  the  wall,  by  the  illuminating 
glare  of  an  uneasy  guilt.  Pretending,  therefore,  to  be  afraid  lest  His 
body  should  be  stolen  by  His  disciples  for  purposes  of  imposture,  they 
begged  that,  until  the  third  day,  the  tomb  might  be  securely  guarded. 


THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST.  455 

Pilate  gave  them  a  brief  and  haughty  permission  to  do  anything  they 
liked  ;  for — apparently  in  the  evening,  when  the  great  Paschal  Sabbath 
was  over — they  sent  their  guard  to  seal  the  golal^  and  to  watch  the 
sepulchre. 

Night  passed,  and  before  the  faint  streak  of  dawn  began  to  silver 
the  darkness  of  that  first  great  Easter-day,  the  passionate  love  of  those 
women,  who  had  lingered  latest  by  the  cross,  made  them  also  the 
earliest  at  the  tomb.  Carrying  with  them  their  precious  spices,  but 
knowing  nothing  of  the  watch  or  seal,  they  anxiously  inquired  among 
themselves,  as  the  groped  their  way  with  sad  and  timid  steps  through 
the  glimmering  darkness,  "  Who  should  roll  away  for  them  the  great 
stone  which  closed  the  sepulchre?"  The  two  Marys  were  foremost 
of  this  little  devoted  band,  and  after  them  came  Salome  and  Joanna. 
They  found  their  difficulty  solved  for  them.  It  became  known  then, 
or  afterwards,  that  some  dazzling  angelic  vision  in  white  robes  had 
terrified  the  keepers  of  the  tomb,  and  had  rolled  the  stone  from  the 
tomb  amid  the  shocks  of  earthquake.  And  as  they  came  to  the  tomb, 
there  they  too  saw  angels  in  white  apparel,  who  bade  them  hasten 
back  to  the  Apostles,  and  tell  them — and  especially  Peter — that  Christ, 
according  to  His  own  word,  had  risen  from  the  dead,  and  would  go 
before  them,  like  a  shepherd,  into  their  own  beloved  and  native  Galilee. 
They  hurried  back  in  a  tumult  of  rapture  and  alarm,  telling  no  one  except 
the  disciples  ;  and  even  to  the  disciples  their  words  sounded  like  an 
idle  tale.  But  Mary  of  Magdala,  who  seems  to  have  received  a  separate 
and  special  intimation,  hastened  at  once  to  Peter  and  John.  No  sooner 
had  they  received  this  startling  news  than  they  rose  to  see  with  tbeir 
own  eyes  what  had  happened.  John  outstripped  in  speed  his  elder 
companion,  and  arriving  first,  stooped  down,  and  gazed  in  silent 
wonder  into  that  open  grave.  The  grave  was  empty,  and  the  linen 
cerements  were  lying  neatly  folded  each  in  its  proper  place.  Then 
Peter  came  up,  and  with  his  usual  impetuosity,  heedless  of  ceremonial 
pollution,  and  of  every  consideration  but  his  love  and  his  astonish- 
ment, plunged  into  the  sepulchre.  John  followed  him,  and  saw,  and 
believed  ;  and  the  two  Apostles  took  back  the  undoubted  certainty  to 
their  wondering  brethren.  In  spite  of  fear,  and  anxiety,  and  that  da  11 
intelligence  which,  by  their  own  confession,  was  so  slow  to  realise  the 
truths  they  had  been  taught,  there  dawned  upon  them,  even  then,  the 
trembling  hope,  which  was  so  rapidly  to  become  the  absolute  con- 
viction, that  Christ  had  risen  indeed.  That  on  that  morning  the 
grave  of  Christ  was  nntenanted — that  His  body  had  not  been  removed 


456  THE    LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

by  His  enemies — that  its  absence  caused  to  His  disciples  the  pro- 
foundest  amazement,  not  unmingled,  in  the  breasts  of  some  of  them, 
•with  sorrow  and  alarm — that  they  subsequently  became  convinced,  by 
repeated  proofs,  that  He  had  indeed  risen  from  the  dead — that  for  the 
truth  of  this  belief  they  were  ready  at  all  times  themselves  to  die — 
that  the  belief  effected  a  profound  and  total  change  in  their  character, 
making  the  timid  courageous,  and  the  weak  irresistible — that  they 
were  incapable  of  a  conscious  falsehood,  and  that,  even  if  it  had  not 
been  so,  a  conscious  falsehood  could  never  have  had  power  to  convince 
the  disbelief  and  regenerate  the  morality  of  the  world — that  on  this 
belief  of  the  resurrection  were  built  the  still  universal  observance  of 
the  first  day  of  the  week  and  the  entire  foundations  of  the  Christian 
Church — these,  at  any  rate,  are  facts  which  even  scepticism  itself,  if  it 
desires  to  be  candid,  can  hardly  fail,  however  reluctantly  and  slowly, 
to  admit. 

1.  But  as  yet  no  eye  had  seen  Him ;  and  to  Mary  of  Magdala — to 
her  who  loved  most  because  she  had  been  forgiven  most,  and  out  of 
whose  soul,  now  ardent  as  flame  and  clear  as  crystal,  He  had  cast  seven 
devils — was  this  glorious  honour  first  vouchsafed.  Even  the  vision  of 
angels  had  not  soothed  the  passion  of  agitation  and  alarm  which  she 
experienced  when,  returning  once  more  to  the  tomb,  she  found  that  it 
was  no  longer  possible  for  her  to  pay  the  last  offices  of  devotion  and 
tenderness  to  the  crucified  body  of  her  Lord.  From  her  impassioned 
soul  not  even  the  white-robed  visions  and  angel  voices  could  expel  the 
anguish  which  she  experienced  in  the  one  haunting  thought,  "  They 
have  taken  away  my  Lord  out  of  the  sepulchre,  and  I  know  not  where 
they  have  laid  Him."  With  her  whole  heart  absorbed  in  this  thought 
she  turned  away — and  lo  !  Jesus  Himself  standing  before  her.  It  was 
Jesus,  but  not  as  she  had  known  Him.  There  was  something  spiritual, 
something  not  of  earth,  in  that  risen  and  glorified  body.  Some  acci- 
dent of  dress,  or  appearance,  made  her  fancy  that  it  was  the  keeper  of 
the  garden,  and  in  the  eager  hope  that  he  can  explain  to  her  the  secret 
of  that  empty  and  angel-haunted  grave,  she  exclaims  to  Him  in  an 
agony  of  appeal — turning  her  head  aside  as  she  addressed  Him,  per- 
haps that  she  might  hide  her  streaming  tears — "  Oh,  sir,  if  you  took 
Him  away,  tell  me  where  you  put  Him,  and  I  will  take  Him." 

Jesus  saith  to  her,  "  Mary !  " 

That  one  word,  in  those  awful  yet  tender  tones  of  voice,  at  once 
penetrated  to  her  heart.  Turning  towards  Him,  trying  apparently  to 
clasp  His  feet  or  the  hem  of  His  garment,  she  cried  to  Him  in  her 


THE   LIFE   OF   CHRIST.  457 

native  Aramaic,  "  Rabboni !  "  "  Oh,  my  Master !  "  and  then  remained 
speechless  with  her  transport.  Jesus  Himself  gently  checked  the 
passion  of  her  enthusiasm.  "Cling  not  to  Me,"  He  exclaimed,  "for 
not  yet  have  I  ascended  to  the  Father ;  but  go  to  My  brethren,  and 
say  to  them,  I  am  ascending  to  My  Father  and  your  Father,  and  My 
God  and  your  God."  Awe-struck,  she  hastened  to  obey.  She 
repeated  to  them  that  solemn  message — and  through  all  future  ages 
has  thrilled  that  first  utterance,  which  made  on  the  minds  of  those 
who  heard  it  so  indelible  an  impression  —  "I  HAVE  SEEN  THE 
LORD." 

2.  Nor  was  her  testimony  unsupported.  Jesus  met  the  other 
women  also,  and  said  to  them,  "  All  hail !  "  Terror  mingled  with 
their  emotion,  as  they  clasped  His  feet.  "Fear  not,"  He  said  to  them ; 
"  go,  bid  My  brethren  that  they  depart  into  Galilee,  and  there  shall 
they  see  Me." 

It  was  useless  for  the  guards  to  stay  beside  an  empty  grave.  With 
fear  for  the  consequences,  and  horror  at  all  that  they  had  seen,  they 
tied  to  the  members  of  the  Sanhedrin  who  had  given  them  their 
secret  commission.  To  these  hardened  hearts  belief  and  investigation 
were  alike  out  of  the  question.  Their  only  refuge  seemed  to  be  in 
lies.  They  instantly  tried  to  hush  up  the  whole  matter.  They 
suggested  to  the  soldiers  that  they  must  have  slept,  and  that  while 
they  did  so  the  disciples  had  stolen  the  body  of  Jesus.  But  such  a 
tale  was  too  infamous  for  credence,  and  too  ridiculous  for  publicity. 
If  it  became  known,  nothing  could  have  saved  these  soldiers, 
supposing  them  to  have  been  Romans,  from  disgrace  and  execu- 
tion. The  Sadducees  therefore  bribed  the  men  to  consult  their 
common  interests  by  burying  the  whole  matter  in  secrecy  and  silence. 
It  was  only  gradually  and  later,  and  to  the  initiated,  that  the  base 
calumny  was  spread.  Within  six  weeks  of  the  resurrection,  that  great 
event  was  the  unshaken  faith  of  every  Christian ;  within  a  few  years 
of  the  event  the  palpable  historic  proofs  of  it  and  the  numerous 
testimonies  of  its  reality — strengthened  by  a  memorable  vision  vouch- 
safed to  himself — had  won  assent  from  the  acute  and  noble  intellect 
of  a  young  Pharisaic  zealot  and  persecutor  whose  name  was  Saul 
(1  Cor.  xv.  4 — 8).  But  it  was  only  in  posthumous  and  subterranean 
whispers  that  the  dark  falsehood  was  disseminated  which  was  intended 
to  counteract  this  overwhelming  evidence.  St.  Matthew  says  that 
when  he  wrote  his  Gospel  it  was  still  commonly  bruited  among  the 
Jews.  It  continued  to  be  received  among  them  for  centuries,  and  is 


458  THE   LIFE    OF  CHRIST. 

one   of  the  blaspheming   follies  which  was   repeated  and  amplified 
twelve  centuries  afterwards  in  the  Toldoih  JesTiu. 

3.  The  third  appearance  of  Jesus  was  to  Peter.      The  details  of  it 
are  wholly  unknown  to  us  (Luke  xxiv.  34 ;  1  Cor.  xv.  5).     They  may 
have  been  of  a  nature  too  personal  to  have  been  revealed.     The  fact 
rests  on  the  express  testimony  of  St.  Luke  and  of  St.  Paul. 

4.  On  the  same  day  the  Lord's  fourth  appearance  was  accompanied 
with  circumstances  of  the  deepest  interest.     Two  of  the  disciples  were 
on  their  way  to  a  village  named  Emmaus,  of  uncertain  site,  but  about 
eight   miles   from   Jerusalem,    and  were   discoursing   with   sad   and 
anxious  hearts  on  the  awful  incidents  of  the  last  two  days,  when  a 
Stranger  joined  them,  and  asked  them  the  cause  of  their  clouded 
looks  and  anxious  words.     They  stopped,  and  looked  at  this  unknown 
traveller  with  a  dubious  and  unfriendly  glance ;  and  when  one  of  the 
two,  whose  name  was  Cleopas,  spoke  in  reply,  there  is  a  touch  of 
surprise  and  suspicion  in  the  answer  which  he  ventured  to  give. 
"  Dost  thou  live  alone  as  a  stranger  in  Jerusalem,  and  dost  thou  not 
know  what  things  happened   there   in  these  last   days  ?  "     "  What 
things  ?  "   He   asked   them.      Then  they  told    Him   how   all  their 
yearning  hopes  that  Jesus  had  been  the  great  Prophet  who  should 
redeem  His  people  had  been  dashed  to  the  earth,  and  how  all  His 
mighty  deeds  before  God  and  the  people  had  ended  two  days  back  on 
the  shameful  cross.     They  described  the  feeling  of  amazement  with 
which,  on  this  the  third  day,  they  had  heard  the  women's  rumours  of 
angel  visions,  and  the  certain  testimony  of  some  of  their  brethren  that 
the  tomb  was  empty  now.     "  But,"  added  the  speaker  with  a  sigh  of 
incredulity  and  sorrow — "  but  Him  they  saw  not." 

Then  reproaching  them  with  the  dnlness  of  their  intelligence  and 
their  affections,  the  Stranger  showed  them  how  through  all  the  Old 
Testament  from  Moses  onwards  there  was  long  prophecy  of  the 
sufferings  no  less  than  of  the  glory  of  Christ.  In  such  high  converse 
they  drew  near  to  Emmaus,  and  the  Stranger  seemed  to  be  going 
onwards,  but  they  pressed  Him  to  stay,  and  as  they  sat  down  to  their 
simple  meal,  and  He  blessed  and  brake  the  bread,  suddenly  their  eyes 
were  opened,  and  in  spite  of  the  altered  form,  they  recognised  that  He 
who  was  with  them  was  the  Lord.  But  even  as  they  recognised  Him, 
He  was  with  them  no  longer.  "  Did  not  our  heart  burn  within  us," 
they  exclaimed  to  each  other,  "  while  He  was  speaking  with  us  in  the 
way,  while  He  was  opening  to  us  the  Scriptures  ?  "  Rising  instantly, 
they  returned  to  Jerusalem  with  the  strange  and  joyous  tidings.  They 


THE   LIFB    OF   CHRIST.  459 

found  no  dubious  listeners  now.  They,  too,  were  received  with  the 
rapturous  affirmation,  "  The  Lord  is  risen  indeed,  and  hath  appeared 
unto  Simon ! " 

5.  Once  more,   for  the   fifth  time   on   that  eternally  memorable 
Easter  day,  Jesus  manifested  Himself  to  His  disciples.     Ten  of  them 
•were  sitting  together,  with  doors  closed  for  fear  of  the  Jews.     As  they 
exchanged  and  discussed  their  happy  intelligence,  Jesus  Himself  stood 
in  the  midst  of  them,  with  the  words,   "  Peace  be  with  you."     The 
unwonted  aspect  of  that  glorified  body — the  awful  significance  of  the 
fact  that  He  had  risen  from  the  dead — scared  and  frightened  them. 
The  presence  of  their  Lord  was  indeed  corporeal,  but  it  was  changed. 
They  thought  that  it  was  a  spirit  which  was  standing  before  them. 
"Why  are  ye  troubled  ?"  He  asked,  "and  why  do  anxious  doubts  rise 
in  your  hearts  ?     See  my  hands  and  my  feet,  that  it  is  I ;  handle  me, 
and  see :  for  a  spirit  hath  not  flesh  and  bones  as  ye  see  me  have." 
Even  while  He  spoke  He  showed  them  His  hands  and  His  side.     And 
then,  while  joy,  amazement,  incredulity,  were  all  struggling  in  their 
hearts,  He  asked  them  if  they  had  there  anything  to  eat;  and  yet 
further  to  assure  them,  ate  a  piece  of  broiled  fish  in  their  presence. 
Then  once  more  He  said,  "  Peace  be  unto  you.     As  my  Father  hath 
sent  me,  even  so  send  I  you."     Breathing  on  them,  He  said,  "  Receive 
ye  the  Holy  Ghost.     Whosesoever  sins  ye  remit,  they  are  remitted  to 
them  :  whosesoever  sins  ye  retain,  they  are  retained." 

6.  One  only  of  the  Apostles  had  been  absent — Thomas  the  Twin. 
His  character,  as  we  have  seen  already,  was  affectionate,  but  melancholy. 
To  him  the  news  seemed  too  good  to  be  true.     In  yain  did  the  other 
disciples  assure  him,  "  We  have   seen  the  Lord."     Happily  for  us, 
though  less  happily  for  him,  he  declared  with  strong  asseveration  that 
nothing  would  convince  him,  short  of  actually  putting  his  own  finger 
into  the  print  of  the   nails,   and  his  hands  into  His  side.     A  week 
passed,   and  the  faithfully-recorded   doubts  of  the  anxious  Apostle 
remained  unsatisfied.     On  the  eighth,  or,  as  we  should  say,  on  the 
seventh  day  afterwards — for  already  the  resurrection  had  made  the 
first  day  of  the  week  sacred  to  the  hearts  of  the  Apostles — the  eleven 
were  again  assembled  within  closed  doors.     Once  more  Jesus  appeared 
to  them,  and  after  His  usual  gentle  and  solemn  blessing,  called  Thomas, 
and  bade  him  stretch  forth  his  finger,  and  put  it  in  the  print  of  the 
nails,  and  to  thrust  his  hand  into  the  spear- wound  of  His  side,  and  to 
be    "  not    faithless,   but    believing."     "  My    Lord    and    my   God ! " 
exclaimed    the    incredulous    Apostle,   with    a    burst    of    conviction, 


460  THE   LIFfi   OF   CHRIST . 

"Because  thou  hast  seen  Me,"  said  Jesus,  "thou  hast  believed; 
blessed  are  they  who  saw  not  and  yet  believed." 

7.  The  next  appearance  of  the  risen  Saviour  was  to  seven  of  the 
Apostles  by  the  Sea  of  Galilee — Simon,  Thomas,  Nathanael,  the  sons 
of  Zebedee,  and  two  others — not  improbably  Philip  and  Andrew — who 
are  not  named  (John  xxi.  1 — 24).  A  pause  had  occurred  in  the  visits 
of  Jesus,  and  before  they  returned  to  Jerusalem  at  Pentecost  to  receive 
the  promised  outpouring  of  the  Spirit,  Simon  said  that  he  should 
resume  for  the  day  his  old  trade  of  a  fisherman.  There  was  no  longer 
a  common  purse,  and  as  their  means  of  subsistence  were  gone,  this 
seemed  to  be  the  only  obvious  way  of  obtaining  an  honest  maintenance. 
The  others  proposed  to  join  him,  and  they  set  sail  in  the  evening, 
because  night  is  the  best  time  for  fishing.  All  night  they  toiled  in 
vain.  At  early  dawn,  in  the  misty  twilight,  there  stood  on  the  shore 
the  figure  of  One  whom  they  did  not  recognise.  A  voice  asked  them 
if  they  had  caught  anything.  "  No,"  was  the  despondent  answer. 
"Fling  your  net  to  the  right  side  of  the  vessel,  and  ye  shall  find." 
They  made  the  cast,  and  instantly  were  scarcely  able  to  draw  the  net 
from  the  multitude  of  fishes.  The  incident  awoke,  with  overwhelm- 
ing force,  the  memory  of  earlier  days.  "  It  is  the  Lord,"  whispered 
John  to  Peter ;  and  instantly  the  warm-hearted  enthusiast,  tightening 
his  fisher's  tunic  round  his  loins,  leaped  into  the  sea,  to  swim  across  the 
hundred  yards  which  separated  him  from  Jesus,  and  cast  himself,  all 
wet  from  the  waves,  before  His  feet.  More  slowly  the  others  followed, 
dragging  the  strained  but  unbroken  net,  with  its  153  fishes.  A  wood 
fire  was  burning  on  the  strand,  some  bread  lay  beside  it,  and  some  fish 
were  being  broiled  on  the  glowing  embers.  It  is  a  sight  which  may 
often  be  seen  to  this  day  by  the  shores  of  Galilee.  And  He  who  stood 
beside  it  bade  them  bring  more  fish  of  those  which  they  had  caught. 
Instantly  Simon  started  up,  and  helped  with  his  strong  arm  to 
drag  the  net  ashore.  And  He  whom  they  all  kuew  to  be  the  Lord, 
but  whose  voice  and  aspect  made  their  hearts  so  still  with  awful 
reverence  that  they  dared  not  question  Him,  bade  them,  "  Come  and 
breakfast,"  and  distributed  to  them  the  bread  and  fish. 

The  happy  meal  ended  in  silence,  and  then  Jesus  said  to  His  weak 
but  fond  Apostle,  "  Simon  " — (it  was  no  time  as  yet  to  restore  to  him 
the  name  of  Peter) — "  Simon,  son  of  Jonas,  honourest  thou  Me  more 
than  these  ?  " 

"Yea,  Lord,  Thou  kno west  that  I  love  Thee." 

"Feed  My  little  lambs." 


THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST.  461 

Simon  had  felt  in  his  inmost  heart  what  was  meant  by  that  kind 
rebuke — "  more  than  these."  It  called  back  to  his  penitent  soul  those 
boastful  words,  uttered  so  confidently  among  his  brethen,  "  Although 
all  shall  be  offended,  yet  will  not  I."  Failure  had  taught  him  humility, 
and  therefore  he  will  neither  claim  a  pre-eminence  in  affection,  nor  adopt 
the  word  of  the  Saviour's  question  (arycnras),  which  involved  deep 
honour  and  devotion  and  esteem ;  but  will  substitute  for  it  that  weaker 
word,  which  yet  best  expressed  the  warm  human  affection  of  his  heart. 
And  the  next  time  the  question  reminded  him  less  painfully  of  his  old 
self-confidence,  for  Jesus  said  to  him  only — 

"  Simon,  son  of  Jonas,  honourest  thou  Me  ?  " 

Again  the  Apostle  humbly  answered  in  the  same  words  as  before — 

"  Yea,  Lord,  Thou  knowest  that  I  love  Thee." 

"  Tend  my  sheep." 

But  Simon  had  thrice  denied,  and  therefore  it  was  fitting  that  he 
should  thrice  confess.  Again,  after  a  brief  pause,  came  the  question 
— and  this  time  with  the  weaker  but  warmer  word  which  the  Apostle 
himself  had  chosen — 

"  Simon,  son  of  Jonas,  lovest  thou  Me  ?  " 

And  Simon,  deeply  humbled  and  distressed,  exclaimed,  "Lord, 
Thou  knowest  all  things ;  Thou  seest  that  I  love  Thee." 

"  Feed  My  beloved  sheep."  Then  very  solemnly  He  added,  "Verily, 
verily,  I  say  unto  thee,  When  thou  wast  younger  thou  didst  gird  thy- 
self, and  walk  where  thou  wouldest ;  but  when  thou  art  old  thou  shalt 
stretch  out  thy  hands,  and  another  shall  gird  thee,  and  shall  lead  thee 
where  thou  wiliest  not." 

The  Apostle  understood  Him ;  he  knew  that  this  implied  the  years 
of  his  future  service,  the  pangs  of  his  future  martyrdom ;  but  now  he 
was  no  longer  " Simon,"  but  " Peter!' — the  heart  of  rock  was  in  him ; 
he  was  ready,  even  to  the  death,  to  obey  the  voice  which  said  to  him, 
"  Follow  Me."  While  the  conversation  had  been  taking  place  he  had 
been  walking  by  the  side  of  Jesus,  a  few  steps  in  front  of  his  comrades. 
Looking  back  he  saw  John,  his  only  favourite  companion,  and  the  dis- 
ciple whom  Jesus  loved,  slowly  following  them.  Pointing  to  him,  he 
asked,  "  Lord,  and  what  shall  he  do  ?  "  The  answer  checked  the  spirit 
of  idle  curiosity — "  If  I  will  that  he  tarry  till  I  come,  what  is  that  to 
thee  ?  Follow  thou  Me."  Peter  dared  ask  no  more,  and  the  answer — 
which  was  intentionally  vague — led  to  the  wide  misapprehension  pre- 
valent in  the  early  Church,  that  John  was  not  to  die  until  Jesus  came. 
The  Apostle  quietly  corrects  the  error  by  quoting  the  exact  words  of 


462  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

the  risen  Christ.  The  manner  of  his  death  we  do  not  know,  bat  we 
know  that  he  outlived  all  his  brother  disciples,  and  that  he  survived 
that  terrible  overthrow  of  his  nation  which,  since  it  rendered  impossible 
a  strict  obedience  to  the  institutions  of  the  Old  Covenant,  and  opened 
throughout  the  world  an  unimpeded  path  for  the  establishment  of  the 
Xew  Commandment  and  the  Kingdom  not  of  earth,  was — in  a  sense 
more  true  than  any  other  event  in  human  history — a  second  coming  of 
the  Lord. 

8.  It  may  have  been  on  this  occasion  that  Jesus  told  His  disciples 
of  the  mountain  in  Galilee,  where  He  would  meet  all  who  knew  and 
loved  Him  for  the  last  time.      Whether  it  was  Tabor,  or  the  Mountain 
of  Beatitudes,  we  do  not  know,  but  more  than  five  hundred  of  His 
disciples  collected  at  the  given  time  with  the  eleven,  and  received  from 
Jesus  His  last  commands,  to  teach  and  baptise  throughout  all  nations ; 
and  the  last  promise,  that  He  would  be  with  them  always,  even  to  the 
end  of  the  world.     Writing  more  than  twenty  years  after  this  time, 
St.  Paul  gives  us  the  remarkable  testimony,  that  the  greater  number 
of  these  eye-witnesses  of  the  resurrection  were  yet  alive,  and  that  some 
only  were  "  fallen  asleep." 

9.  A  ninth  appearance   of   Jesus   is   unrecorded   in  the  Gospels, 
and  is  known  to  us  from  a  single  allusion  in  St.  Paul  alone.     "I 
delivered  unto  you,"  he  writes  to  the  Corinthians  (1  Cor.  xv.  3 — 8), 
"that  which  also   I  received,   how  that  Christ  died  for   our   sins» 
according   to   the    Scriptures;    and   that   He  was   buried,   and   that 
He  rose  again  the  third  day,  according  to  the  Scriptures ;  and  that 
He  was  seen   of   Cephas,  then  of  the   Twelve;    after  that,  he   was 
seen  of  above  five  hundred  brethren  at   once:  ....  after   that,  He 
loos  seen  of  James;  then  of  all  the  Apostles.      And  last  of  all  He 
appeared  to  me  also,  as  to  the  abortive- born  (of  the  Apostolic  family)." 
Respecting  this  appearance  to  James  we  know  nothing  further,  unless 
there  be  any  basis  of  true  tradition  in  the  story  preserved  to  us  in  the 
Gospel  of  the  Hebrews.      We  are  there  told  that  James,  the  first 
Bishop  of  Jerusalem,   and  the  Lord's  brother,  had,   after  the  Last 
Supper,  taken  a  solemn  vow  that  he  would  neither  eat  nor  drink  until 
he  had  seen  Jesus  risen  from  the  dead.      Early,  therefore,  after  His 
resurrection,  Jesus,  after  He  had  given  the  sinddn  to  the  servant  of 
the  priest,  had  a  table  with  bread  brought  out,  blessed  the  bread,  and 
gave  it  to  James,  with  the  words,  "  Eat  thy  bread  now,  my  brother, 
since  the  Son  of  Man  has  risen  from  the  dead." 

10.  Forty  days  had  now  elapsed  since  the   Crucifixion.     During 


TBUS   LIFE   OF  CHSISf.  4G3 

those  forty  days  nine  times  had  He  been  visibly  present  to  human 
eyes,  and  had  been  touched  by  human  hands.  But  His  body  had  not 
been  merely  the  human  body,  nor  liable  to  merely  human  laws,  now 
had  He  lived  during  those  days  the  life  of  men.  The  time  had 
now  come  when  His  earthly  presence  should  be  taken  away  from 
them  for  ever,  until  He  returned  in  glory  to  judge  the  world. 
He  met  them  in  Jerusalem,  and  as  He  led  them  with  Him  towards 
Bethany,  He  bade  them  wait  in  the  Holy  City  until  they  had 
received  the  promise  of  the  Spirit.  He  checked  their  eager 
inquiry  about  the  times  and  the  seasons,  and  bade  them  be  His 
witnesses  in  all  the  world.  These  last  farewells  must  have  been 
uttered  in  some  of  the  wild  secluded  upland  country  that  surrounds 
the  little  village ;  and  when  they  were  over,  He  lifted  up  His  hand* 
and  blessed  them,  and,  even  as  He  blessed  them,  was  parted  from 
them,  and  as  He  passed  from  before  their  yearning  eyes  "a  cloud 
received  Him  out  of  their  sight "  (Luke  xxiv.  50,  51 ;  Acts  i.  6 — 9). 

Between  us  and  His  visible  presence — between  us  and  that  glorified 
Redeemer  who  now  sitteth  at  the  right  hand  of  God — that  cloud  still 
rolls.  But  the  eye  of  Faith  can  pierce  it ;  the  incense  of  true  prayer 
can  rise  above  it ;  through  it  the  dew  of  blessing  can  descend.  And 
if  He  is  gone  away,  yet  He  has  given  us  in  His  Holy  Spirit  a  nearer 
sense  of  His  presence,  a  closer  infolding  in  the  arms  of  His  tenderness, 
than  we  could  have  enjoyed  even  if  we  had  lived  with  Him  of  old  in 
the  home  of  Nazareth,  or  sailed  with  Him  in  the  little  boat  over  the 
crystal  waters  of  Gennesareth.  "We  may  be  as  near  to  Him  at  all  times 
— and  more  than  all  when  we  kneel  down  to  pray — as  the  beloved 
disciple  was  when  he  laid  his  head  upon  His  breast.  The  Word  of 
God  is  very  nigh  us,  even  in  our  mouths  and  in  our  hearts.  To  ears 
that  have  been  closed  His  voice  may  seem  indeed  to  sound  no  longer. 
The  loud  noises  of  War  may  shake  the  world ;  the  calls  of  Avarice  and 
of  Pleasure  may  drown  the  gentle  utterance  which  bids  us  "  Follow 
Me; "  after  two  thousand  years  of  Christianity  the  incredulous  murmurs 
of  an  impatient  scepticism  may  make  it  scarcely  possible  for  Faith  to 
repeat,  without  insult,  the  creed  which  has  been  the  regeneration  of  the 
world.  Ay,  and  sadder  even  than  this,  every  now  and  then  may  be 
heard,  even  in  Christian  England,  the  insolence  of  some  blaspheming 
tongue  which  still  scoffs  at  the  Son  of  God  as  He  lies  in  the  agony  of 
the  garden,  or  breathes  His  last  sigh  upon  the  bitter  tree.  But  the 
aecret  of  the  Lord  is  with  them  that  fear  Him,  and  He  will  show 
them  His  covenant.  To  all  who  will  listen  He  still  speaks.  He 


4^4  THE   LIFE    OF   CHRIST. 

promised  to  be  with  us  always,  even  to  the  end  of  the  world,  and  we 
have  not  found  His  promise  fail.  It  was  but  for  thirty-three  short 
years  of  a  short  lifetime  that  He  lived  on  earth ;  it  was  but  for  three 
broken  and  troubled  years  that  He  preached  the  Gospel  of  the 
Kingdom  ;  but  for  ever,  even  until  all  the  JEons  have  been  closed,  and 
the  earth  itself,  with  the  heavens  that  now  are,  have  passed  away, 
shall  every  one  of  His  true  and  faithful  children  find  peace  and  hope 
and  forgiveness  in  His  name,  and  that  name  shall  be  called  Emmanuel, 
which  is,  being  interpreted, 

"  GOD  WITH  rs." 


ItfDEX. 


A. 

Abgarus  V.,  King  of  Edessa,  tradition 
regarding,  335. 

Ablutions  before  meals,  not  observed 
by  our  Lord's  disciples,  209;  of  the 
leading  Jews,  209. 

Aceldama  ("  Field  of  Blood"),  417. 

Adam,  skull  of,  at  the  foot  of  the  cross, 
438. 

Adulteress,  decision  in  the  case  of  an, 
260—265. 

yEnon,  near  Salim,  94. 

Ago  of  Christ  at  His  baptism  by  John, 
53. 

Agony  in  the  garden,  391. 

Allegories  and  Parables,  273. 

Alms-giving,  359. 

Ambition  of  the  disciples  rebuked,  247. 

Andrew,  calling  of,  66,  67. 

Andrew,  Greek  name  of,  116. 

"Angel  to  the  Shepherds,"  chapel  of 
the,  1. 

Anna,  the  prophetess,  9,  10. 

Annas  (Hanan),  319, 401, 402  ;  Christ's 
trial  before,  402 — 406 ;  his  share 
in  the  guilt  of  the  death  of  Christ, 
403 ;  his  end,  433. 

Antipas,  son  of  Herod  the  Great,  22 ; 
character  and  career  of,  180 — 186 ; 
gives  a  banquet,  at  which  Salome 
dances,  182,  183;  wishes  to  see 
Christ,  185;  spleen  of  as  "that 
fox"  by  Chribt,  276;  Christ  sent 
by  Pilate  to,  422  ;  his  end,  433. 

Antonia,  Tower  of,  276. 

Apocryphal  Gospels — their  character, 
26. 

Apocryphal  History  of  Joseph  the 
Carpenter,  44. 

Apostles,  the  calling  of  tfie  first,  65 — 
73 ;  enumerated  and  characterised, 
116 — 118;  sent  out  two  and  two, 
168 — 170  ;  return  from  their  mie- 


sion,  185 ;  questioned  by  Christ  us 
to  their  belief  in  Him,  234,  235 ; 
their  misunderstanding  of  Christ's 
mission,  238 ;  dispute  as  to  which 
is  to  be  the  greatest,  247 ;  Christ 
appears  after  His  resurrection  to 
ten  of  the,  459. 

Appearance  of  our  Lord,  traditiotal 
account  of  the,  68,  69. 

Arehelaus,  22,  24. 

Arimatheea,  453. 

Ascension,  the,  *63. 

Asceticism,  49. 

Authority,  Christ's,  340. 

B. 

Baptism,  by  John,  of  Christ,  53,  54; 

by  Christ's  disciples,  94. 
Baptism  of  John,  from  Heaven  or  of 

men?  341. 
Bar-Abbas,  427,  428. 
Bar-jona:  see  Peter. 
Barley-loaves :  see  Five  thousand. 
Bartholomew  identified  with  Natha- 

nael,  70,  116. 
Bartimaeus,  blind,  and  his  companion 

healed,  322. 

Beelzebul,  215 :   see  also  Devil. 
"  Beside  himself,"  our  Lord  considered, 

129. 
Bethany,  Christ  at  the  house  of  Lazarus 

at,  300  et  seq. ;  the  last  evening  at, 

365,  366. 
Bothesda,  Pool  of,  172,  173;   Christ's 

miracle  there,  173. 
Bethlehem,  4,  22. 
Bethphage,  330. 
Bethsaida,  or  "Fish-house"  (liethsaida 

Julias),  178,  233. 
Bethsaida  (Western],  125. 
Blind  man,  at  Bethsaida,  healed,  -IG3  ; 

blind  from  his  birth,  healed.  269— 

272. 

2  H 


466 


INDEX. 


Bloody  flux  healed,  164,  165. 
Boat,  Christ  preaches  from  a,  112. 
Body  of  Christ  after  the  Resurrection, 

459. 

Boyhood  of  Christ,  22 — 30. 
Brahe,  Tycho,  star  seen  by,  13. 
Bread  of  Life,  Jesus  the,  194. 
Brethren  of  Jesus,  44,  45 ;    they  try 

to  assert  a  claim  on  Christ's  actions, 

151 ;  desire  to  speak  with  Jesus, 

218. 
Burial,  Eastern,  316 ;  of  Christ,  454. 

C. 

Caesar,  rights  of,  347  et  seq. 

Caesarea  Philippi,  234. 

Caiaphas,  the  civil  High  Priest,  318, 
319,  406 ;  meeting  in  the  palace  of, 
367  et  seq. ; '  Christ's  trial  before, 
406 — 409 ;  the  end  of,  433. 

Calvary  (Golgotha),  437. 

Cana  of  Galilee,  marriage  in,  74  et  seq. 

Capernaum,'  the  earliest  centre  of 
Christ's  ministry,  80;  described, 
80  et  seq. ;  site  of,  84,  85 ;  Christ 
makes  it  His  home  after  leaving 
Cana,  108;  Christ's  first  Sabbath 
there,  108  et  seq. ;  discourse  at,  192 
—198. 

Caravanserai,  or  Khan,  Eastern,  2,  3. 

Carpenter,  Christ  as  a,  37,  38. 

Cave,  a,  the  scene  of  the  Nativity,  3. 

Celibacy,  the  question  of,  309. 

Census  in  time  of  Augustus,  3. 

Centurion's  servant,  healing  of  the, 
127,  128. 

Children  blessed,  310,  311. 

Children  of  the  devil,  268. 

Chorazin,  232. 

"  Christ,"  meaning  of  the  name,  9 :  tee 
Jesus. 

Christianity,  its  character,  123. 

Chronology :  tee  Order  of  Events. 

Circumcision  of  Christ,  7,  8. 

Cities,  Oriental,  365. 

Claudia  Procula,  wife  of  Pilate,  426. 

Cleopas,  458. 

Commandment,  the  greatest,  352,  353. 

Commandment,  the  new,  383. 

Counting  the  cost,  284. 

Council :  tee  Sanhedrin. 

Cross,  size  and  structure  of  the,  435. 

Crown  of  thorns,  the,  429.' 

Crucifixion  of  Christ,  435 — 451. 

Crucifixion  as  a  punishment,  435,  438 
et  seq. 

Cyrenius  (P.  Snip.  Quirinus),  4. 


D. 

Dancers  and  dancing-women,  183. 

David,  Christ  the  Son  of,  354. 

Dead  to  bury  their  dead,  152. 

Deaf  man  with  an  impediment  in  his 
„  speech  cured,  227. 

Death,  the  fear  of,  394. 

Decapolis,  the  regions  of,  Christ's  visit 
to,  227,  228. 

Dedication,  Feast  of  the,  274,  300; 
founded  by  Judas  Haccabseus,  302 ; 
Christ  at  the,  302. 

Demoniac,  a,  cured  at  Capernaum,  109 ; 
blind  and  dumb,  cured,  214 ;  boy, 
245  et  seq. 

Demoniacal  possession,  157,  158. 

Descendants  of  David,  the,  18. 

Devil,  our  Lord  accused  "of  being  in 
league  with  the,  215,  216. 

Didymus :  see  Thomas. 

Disciples,  Christ  appears  after  His  re- 
surrection to  more  than  five  hun- 
dred, 462;  see  also  Seventy  dis- 
ciples, the. 

"Discrepancies"  in  the  narrative  of 
Christ's  trial,  &c.,  400  et  seq. 

Divorce,  the  question  of,  306  et  seq. 

Dove,  the  offering  of  the  poor,  87. 

Doves,  Valley  of,  81. 

Dress  of  Christ,  143,  144. 

Dropsy,  man  afflicted  with  the,  healed, 
289  et  seq. 

E. 

Eagle,  the,  a  Roman  symbol,  364. 
Easter,  Jerusalem  at,  85. 
Education  of  Christ,  39  et  seq. 
Egypt,  flight  into,  7,  8,  16  et  seq. 
Ellas  at  Christ's  transfiguration,  243  ; 

Jewish  expectation  of,  244. 
Emmaus,    Christ    appears    after    His 

resurrection  to    two    disciples   on 

their  way  to,  458. 
En-gannim   (the  "Fountain  of  Gar- 

dens"),  282,283. 
Enemies,  loving  one's,  120. 
Enthusiasm  and  madness,  128,  129. 
Ephraim,  Christ  retires  to  the  village 

of,  319. 
Evangelists,  evidence  of  the,  7 ;  faith- 

fulness  of  the,  57. 
Evil  Counsel,  Hill  of,  330. 
Excommunication  of  Christ,  probable, 

272. 
Exorcism  of  demons,  215. 


UN1JEX. 


467 


F. 

Faith,  all  things  possible  to  a  perfect, 

246. 
Fasting  of  Christ,  59;  sanctioned  by 

Christ,  59 ;  His  answer  to  John's 

disciples  regarding,  162,  199. 
Feast,  the    day  of   Matthew's,  159— 

167. 
Feast,  unnamed,  the  Feast  of  Purim, 

171. 

Feet,  washing  the  disciples',  375,  376. 
Fig-tree  cursed,  338—340,  345. 
Fig-tree,  custom  of  pious  Jews  to  pray 

under  a,  72. 
"  Fishers  of  men,"  113. 
Fishes,  miraculous   draught    of,   112, 

460. 

Five  thousand,  feeding  of  the,  186—189. 
Fool,  parable  of  the  Rich,  223. 
Forgiveness   of   sins    by  Christ,  139, 

160,  198,  199. 

Forgiveness,  the  lesson  of,  249. 
Fringes  to  Jewish  garments,  165. 

G. 

Gadarene  demoniac,  the,  155,  156. 
Gadarenes — their  treatment  of  Christ, 

159. 

Galilsean    ministry    of    Christ,    com- 
mencement of,  106  et  seq. 
Galilaeans  massacred,  275,  276,  419. 
Galilee  described,  23 ;   the  estimation 

in  which  it  was  held,  30 ;  modern 

Jews  and,  259. 
Galilee,  our  Lord's  life  in,  142 — 148 ; 

His  farewell  to,  274. 
Galilee,  Sea  of :  see  Gennesareth. 
Garments  of  Jesus,  division  of  the,  441. 
Gehenna,  222. 
Gemara,  210. 
Gennesareth,  Lake   of,  81 ;    sea-fight 

on  the,  280  ;  our  Lord  appears  after 

His  resurrection  at  the,  460. 
Gennesareth,  Land  of,  81. 
Gentiles,  Court  of  the,  35,  86,  334. 
Gergesenes,  their  treatment  of  Christ, 

159. 

Gerizim,  Mount,  98. 
Gethsemane,  Garden  of,  389  et  seq. 
Glutton,  a,  and  a  wine-drinker,   our 

Lord  charged  with  being,  199. 
Golgotha  (Calvary),  437. 
Gospels,  character  of  the,  5. 
Governor  of  the  feast,  the,  77. 
Greek  learning,  42. 
Greeks,  some,  desire  an  interview  with 

Jesus,  335. 


H. 

Hanan :  see  Annas. 

Hattln,  Horns  of,  the  probable  scene 

of    the    Sermon    on    the    Mount, 

115. 

Health  of  Christ's  life,  147. 
"  Herald  Angel,"  Chapel  of  the,  2. 
Herod  Antipas :  see  Antipas. 
Herod  Archelaus :  see  Archelaus. 
Herod  the  Great,  11,  18;    saying  of 

the  Emperor  Augustus  on  Herod's 

cruelty,  19. 
Herodians  conspire  with  the  Pharisees 

to  tempt  Christ,  346. 
Herodias  carried  off  by  Herod  Antipas, 

180;  hates  John  the  Baptist,  182; 

accomplishes  his  murder,  184  ;  hex 

future  career,  186. 
High  Priest :  see  Annas,  Caiaphas. 
Hillel,  one  of  the    founders    of   the 

Masorah,  35 ;   views  of  his  school 

on  divorce,  306. 
Hospitality,  Oriental,  137,  168. 
Husbandmen  in  the  vineyard,  the  re- 
bellious, 342,  343. 
Hyssop,  447. 

I. 

Infancy  of  Christ,  events  of  the,  7. 
Innocents,  Massacre  of  the,  17  et  seq. 
Inscription  on  the  cross,  440,  441. 

J. 

Jacob's  Well,  96 ;  its  situation,  99. 

Jairus*  daughter  raised,  164 — 166. 

James,  St.,  the  Apocryphal  Gospel  of, 
on  Christ's  Nativity,  6. 

James,  the  son  of  Zebedee,  an  apostle, 
117. 

James  the  Less,  116. 

Jealousy,  water  of,  261. 

Jericho,  322—324. 

Jerome,  St.,  3. 

Jerusalem,  Christ  weeps  over,  331, 
332 ;  destruction  of,  332,  357, 364  et 
seq. ;  lamentation  over,  356 ;  num- 
ber of  Jews  who  perished  in  the 
destruction  of,  358. 

"Jesus,"  the  name,  9. 

Jesus,  birth  of,  1 — 7;  the  Son  of 
David,  354;  circumcision,  8;  pre- 
sentation in  the  Temple,  7 — 10; 
carried  into  Egypt,  16  et  seq. ;  boy- 
hood of,  22  et  seq. ;  among  the  doc* 
tors,  34  ;  His  education,  39  et  seq.  ; 
His  trade,  38  ;  His  baptism,  53,  -H  ; 
temptation  of,  64— 04;  His  first 


468 


miracle,  74 — 80;  His  first  cleansing 
of  the  Temple,  8-5 — 91 ;  visits  the 
synagogue  at  Nazareth,  102 — 104 ; 
Sermon  on  tha  Mount,  115 — 124; 
His  life  in  Galilee,  142 ;  His  dress, 
143;  His  aspect,  144;  His  life  a 
life  of  poverty,  simplicity,  toil, 
health,  sorrow,  joy,  145  — 148  ; 
sends  out  the  Twelve  on  a  mis- 
sionary journey,  168 — 171 ;  feeds 
the  five  thousand,  186 — 189;  His" 
transfiguration,  241 — 244 ;  at  the 
Feast  of  Tabernacles,  252—259 ; 
sends  out  the  Seventy,  278,  279 ;  at 
the  Feast  of  Dedication,  302  et  seq. ; 
raises  Lazaras,  314,  315 ;  His  second 
cleansing  of  the  Temple,  334 ;  His 
last  supper,  372;  washes  the  dis- 
ciples' feet,  375 ;  examination  and 
trial  of,  400  et  seq. ;  scourged  and 
mocked,  428,  429 ;  crucifixion  of, 
435 — 451 ;  His  resurrection,  455  ; 
last  appearances  of,  456  —  463  ; 
ascension  of,  463 ;  traditional  say- 
ings of,  206. 

Jewish  race,  avarice  of  the,  293. 

Jewish  youth,  education  of  a,  31. 

Jews :  see  Sanhedrin,  Scribes,  Phari- 
sees, Sadducees,  &c. 

Joanna,  the  wife  of  Chuza,  Herod's 
steward,  106. 

John  the  Baptist  and  his  mission, 
48 — 54 ;  he  points  out  Jesus  as 
the  Messiah,  65,  66;  his  baptism 
of  repentance,  94;  his  testimony, 
95 ;  sends  a  message  to  Christ, 
131 ;  in  prison,  131 ;  Christ  eulo- 
gises, 134,  135;  summoned  before 
llerod,  181;  murdered,  184;  buried, 
184. 

John's  disciples  question  Christ  as  to 
fasting,  161,  162. 

John,  the  son  of  Zebedee,  calling  of, 
66,  67 ;  his  intimate  association 
with  Christ,  117;  his  character, 
117  ;  at  Christ's  grave,  455. 

Joseph  of  Arimathasa,  377,  453. 

Joseph,  husband  of  the  Virgin,  tradi- 
tion regarding  a  former  marriage 
of,  44. 

Joscphus — his  so-called  allusion  to 
Christ,  20. 

Joy  of  Christ's  life,  147,  118. 

Judo,  116. 

Judas  Iscariot,    an   apostle,  117;  his 
treachery  foretold  by  Christ,  198; 
p,  327;  bargains  to  betray 


Christ,  328,  329,  368—372;  his 
motive  for  betraying  Christ,  370, 
371 ;  his  end,  416. 

Judas  the  Asmonsean,  302. 

Judgment,  the  Day  of,  364,  365. 

Justin  Martyr,  3. 

K. 

Kana  el-Jelil,  142. 

Kedron,  brook  of,  389 ;  valley  of,  333. 

Kefr  Kenna,  142. 

Kepler  on  the  "  Star  in  the  East," 

14. 

Keys,  the  power  of  the,  236,  237. 
Khan,  Eastern  :  see  Caravanserai. 
Kingdom  of  God,  coming  of  the, 

298,  299. 

King's  Banquet,  parable  of  the,  292. 
Kiss,  Christ  betrayed  with  a,  397. 

L. 
Labour  ennobled  by  Christ,  37 ;  of  His 

life,  146. 
Labourers  in  the  Vineyard,  parable  of 

the,  313. 
Languages    spoken    and    known    by 

Christ,  41,  42. 
Last  Supper,  the,  372 — 382;  not  the 

ordinary  Jewish  Passover,  373. 
Last   things,  discourse  of   the,  361 — 

365. 

Law,  written  and  traditional,  210. 
Lawyers  rebuked  by  Christ,  220,  221. 
Lazarus,   conjectures  regarding,   300, 

400;  raising  of,  314—317. 
Leprosy,  125,  285;  Christ  said  to  be  a 

leper,  68;   a  leper  cleansed,   125; 

sacerdotal     cleansing,     126  ;    ten 

healed,  285. 
Life  (Christ's)  on  earth  a  life  of  poverty, 

simplicity,  toil,  health,  and  sorrow, 

145—147. 

Life,  eternal,  how  to  inherit,  311,  312. 
Light  of  the  World,  267. 
Lilies,  the,  alluded  to  in  the  Sermon 

on  the  Mount,  121. 
Locusts,  the  food  of  John  the  Baptist, 

51. 
Luther  on  the  child-life  of  Christ,  29. 

M. 

Machaerus,  132. 

Madness  and  enthusiasm,  128,  129. 
Magdala   (El  Medjel),    141,   229;    set 

also  Mary  Magdalene. 
Magi,  the  visit  of  the,  7,  8,  11—16. 
Malchtis  has  his  car  cut  off,  399. 


INDKX. 


469 


Manaen,  the  foster-brother  of  Herod, 

106. 

Manners,  domestic,  in  the  East,  137. 
"  Manger  " — what  the  word  represents, 

6. 

Maniacs,  treatment  of,  155,  156. 
Marriage  and  celibacy,  309. 
Marriage  at  Cana,  74. 
Martha,  sister  of  Lazarus,  conjectures 

regarding,  300 ;  her  character,  301. 
Mary  Magdalene  identified  with  the 

woman  in  the  house  of  Simon  the 

Pharisee,    140,    141  ;    at    Christ's 

tomb,  454 ;  Christ  appears  to,  456, 

457. 
Mary,    sister  of    Lazarus,    300—302, 

315;  anoints  Christ's  head  and  feet, 

326,  327. 
Mary,  the  Virgin,  at  the  Crucifixion, 

444. 
Matthew,  the  Evangelist,  called,  113, 

114;  gives  a  feast,  161. 
Megiddo,  282. 

"Messiah,"  meaning  of  the  name,  9. 
Messianic  prophecies  not  understood 

by  the  Jews,  145,  194. 
Miracle,  the  first,  77. 
Miracles,  how  to  be  viewed,  77 — 80. 
Miracles:    see   separate   entries — Blind 

Man;    Bloody  Flux;    Centurion's 

Servant;    Deaf    Man;    Demoniac, 

&c.  &c. 

Mishna,  the,  210,  353. 
Mission  of  the  twelve  Apostles,  168. 
Missionary  success,  first  essentials  of, 

169. 
Mob,  Christ  calms  the  fury  of  the,  105, 

269,  304. 

Monday  of  Passion  Week,  337—345. 
Money,  Lost  Piece  of,  parable  of  the, 

29*7. 

Moses,  at  Christ's  transfijt  oration,  243. 
Mount,  Sermon  on  the,  115, 119—124. 
Mountain,  Christ  retires  for  prayer  to 

a,  115,  189. 

Mountain  of  Beatitudes,  462. 
Mourning,  Hebrew,  165. 

N. 
Nain   described,   129;   raising  of   the 

widow's  son  at,  1 30. 
Nathnnael,  the  Apostle,  calling  of,  70. 
Nativity,  Church  and  Convent  of  the, 

3. 

Nativity  of  Christ,  1 — 7. 
"Nazarene,"  a  term  of  contempt,  29. 
Na^arones  reject  Christ,  100 — 106. 


Nazareth  described,  23,  24;  Christ's 
home-life  there,  37 — 47. 

Nicodemus,  the  conversation  with,  91 — 
93 ;  speaks  in  defence  of  Christ, 
259;  at  Christ's  burial,  453. 

Nobleman's  son,  healing  of  the,  101. 

0. 

Olives,  Mount  of,  260,  361;  Christ's 
discourse  on  the,  361 — 365. 

Opposition  to  Christ's  teaching,  198 — 
211,  212—219. 

Order  of  events  in  Christ's  ministry 
100,  107,  149,  167,  168,  274,  275.  ' 

P. 

Palestine,  the  physical  geography  of, 
22  23 

Palm  Sunday,  329—337. 

Parables,  Christ's  teaching  in,  149, 150: 
tee  separate  entries — Fool,  parable 
of  the  Rich,  223;  Money,  Lost 
Piece  of,  297;  Sheep,  Lost,  297; 
Prodigal  Son,  201,  298;  Pharisee 
and  Publican,  297 ;  Rich  Man  and 
Lazarus,  294;  Samaritan,  parable 
of  the  Good,  295 ;  "Unjust  Steward, 
293. 

Paralytic,  the,  healed,  160. 

Paschal  Lamb,  373,  451. 

Passover,  vast  crowds  at  Jerusalem  at 
the  celebration  of  the,  33,  85 ;  the 
first  of  Christ's  ministry,  85  et 
teq. ;  of  the  Samaritans  at  the  pre- 
sent day,  381 ;  Jewish  manner  of 
celebrating  the,  381 :  number  of 
lambs  sacrificed  at  the,  373. 

Paul,  Christ  is  seen  by,  462. 

Paulus  on  the  miracle  of  the  tribute- 
money,  251. 

Pertea,  155,  283 ;  Christ's  last  stay  in, 
305,  314. 

Personal  appearance  of  our  Lord,  68, 
69,  144. 

Peter  the  Apostle,  calling  of,  67 ;  his 
intimate  association  with  our  Lord, 
117  ;  his  character,  118 ;  his  house 
at  Capernaum,  160;  his  boldness 
and  failure  on  the  Lake  of  Gen- 
nesareth,  190,  191 ;  his  profession 
of  belief,  197,  235,  236;  rebukes 
Christ,  239,  240  ;  denies  Christ  witli 
oaths,  410,  413;  his  repentance, 
413 ;  at  Christ's  grave,  455 ;  Christ 
appears  to,  458;  Christ's  last  charge 
to,  450,  461. 


470 


INDEX. 


Pharisee  and  the  Publican,  parable  of 
the,  297. 

Pharisee,  Christ  at  the  house  of  a,  219 
et  *e?.,  289. 

Pharisees,  murmuring  of  the,  161,  198, 
199  ;  demand  a  sign,  217 ;  rebuked 
by  Christ,  220;  become  Christ's 
deadly  opponents,  221 ;  disciples 
warned  against  the,  232 ;  intense 
pride  of  the,  291 ;  wish  Christ  to 
declare  plainly  -whether  He  be  the 
Messiah,  303  ;  conspire  wi*h  the 
Herodians,  346;  their  hypocrisy 
denounced  by  Christ,  209,  3-36, 
357  ;  seven  classes  of,  356. 

Philip  tie  apostle,  calling  of,  70. 

Philo,  contemporary  of  Christ,  40. 

Phylacteries,  144,  3~o2. 

Physical  cause  of  the  death  of  Christ, 
"451. 

Pilate,  career  of,  418 — 420 ;  his  mas- 
sacre of  the  Galilaeans,  275 ;  Jesus 
before,  421—433 ;  his  end,  433. 

Plough,  putting  one's  hand  to  the, 
152. 

Pounds,  parable  of  the,  324. 

Poverty  sanctified  by  Christ,  37 ;  of 
His"  life,  145. 

Praetorium,  Herod's,  420. 

Prayer,  the  Lord's,  taught  to  His  dis- 
ciples, '212. 

Precepts,  the  248  affirmative  and  365 
negative,  352. 

Presentation  in  the  Temple,  the,  7 — 10. 

Prodigal  Son,  parable  of  the,  201,  298. 

Prophecies  regarding  the  coming  of 
Christ,  12. 

Prophetic  warnings,  Christ's,  364. 

Publicans,  the,  despised  and  hated, 
113,  114;  Christ's  keeping  com- 
pany with,  a  source  of  offence.  200. 

Purification,  rite  of,  8,  9 ;  of  the  Tem- 
ple by  Christ,  87, 334. 

Purim,  Feast  of,  171. 

Q. 

Quarantania,  by  tradition  the  scene  of 
Christ's  temptation,  55. 


Rabbinical  schools  and  their  teaching, 
352,  353. 

Rabbis  consulted  in  cases  of  doubt  and 
difficulty,  262. 

Raphael's  picture  of  the  "  Transfigura- 
tion," 24o. 


Beceipt    of    Custom,  a,    at    or   rear 

Capernaum,  113,  114. 
"Rejoicing  in  spirit"  of  Christ,  281. 
Resurrection,  the,  455  et  aeq. ;  views  of 

the  Sadducees  on  the,  350. 
Rich  Man  and  Lazarus,  parable  of  the, 

294. 
Riches  and  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven, 

312,  313. 

Roman  tribute  and  taxes,  113. 
Ruler,  the  young,  311,  312. 


Sabbath,  Christ  held  to  have  violated 
the,  174—176,  203—208,  270,  286 
— 290;  Jewish  observance  of  the, 
175,  203,  206. 

Sabbath  preceding  Christ's  celebration 
of  the  Passover,  325. 

Sadducees,  the  disciples  warned  against 
the,  232;  views  on  the  resurrec- 
tion held  by  the,  350. 

Salome,  daughter  of  Herodias,  dances 
before  Herod,  183 ;  her  traditional 
end,  186. 

Salome,  the  mother  of  James  and  John 
— her  request  for  her  sons,  321. 

Samaria,  the  woman  of,  95 — 100. 

Samaritan,  Good,  parable  of  the,  295. 

Samaritans  hated  by  the  Jews,  97 ; 
their  hopes  of  the  Messiah,  99. 

Sanhedrin,  10 ;  sends  a  deputation  to 
John  the  Baptist,  52 ;  watches  the 
movements  of  Jesus,  257  ;  its  meet- 
ing after  the  raising  of  Lazarus, 
318 ;  sends  a  deputation  to  Christ, 
340 — 345 ;  constitution  of  the,  406, 
410;  Christ's  trial  before  the,  414 
—416. 

Scourging  of  Christ,  430. 

Scribe,  a,  offers  to  follow  Christ,  151, 
152. 

Scribes,  teaching  of  the,  122;  their 
motive  for  desiring  the  death  of 
Christ,  404. 

Sea,  Christ's  walking  on  the,  190. 

Seizure  of  Christ,  396 — 400. 

Self-sacrifice,  the  law  of,  240. 

Sermon-on  the  Mount,  115,  119 — 124. 

Seventy  Disciples,  the,  275  ;  sent  out, 
278 ;  return  of  the,  296. 

Shammai  on  divorce,  306, 307  ;  on  the 
Sabbath,  204. 

Sheep,  Lost,  parable  of  the,  297. 

Shemaia  (Sameas),  415. 

Shepherds,  announcement  to  the,  1,  2 
they  go  to  the  inn,  5. 


Sidon :  ««  Tyre  and  Sidon. 

Siloam,  Pool  of,  270. 

Siloam,  tower  in,  276. 

Sign  from  heaven,  a,  demanded  by 
the  Pharisees  and  Sadducees,  230. 

Simeon,  9. 

Simon,  a  common  name  amrmg  the 
Jews,  136. 

Simon  of  Cyrene,  436. 

Simon's  wife's  mother  healed,  110. 

Simon  the  leper,  300,  318,  325. 

Simon  the  Pharisee,  the  feast  at  the 
house  of,  136—141. 

Simplicity  of  Christ's  life,  145. 

Sinners  and  Publicans,  Christ's  keep- 
ing company  with,  a  source  of 
offence,  200. 

Society,  state  of,  at  the  time  of  Christ's 
coming,  48. 

Solomon's  Porch,  302. 

Sons  of  Thunder,  the,  284. 

Sons,  parable  of  the  Two,  342. 

Sorrow  of  Christ's  life,  147. 

Sound  of  words,  importance  attached 
by  the  Hebrews  to  the,  29,  67. 

Sower,  parable  of  the,  149. 

Star  in  the  East,  conjectures  respect- 
ing the,  13 — 15. 

Steward,  Unjust,  parable  of  the,  293. 

Stoning,  attempted,  of  Christ,  269,  304. 

Stone  which  the  builders  rejected,  the, 
343. 

Storm  on  the  Sea  of  Galilee  stilled  by 
Christ,  152,  153. 

Superstition  and  incredulity,  424. 

Supper,  Last :  tee  Last  Supper. 

Swine,  the  herd  of,  at  the  curing  of 
the  Gadarene  demoniac,  156. 

Sychar,  near  Jacob's  Well,  96,  102. 

Sycomore  tree,  323. 

Synagogues,  Jewish,  and  their  services, 
described,  102;  one  built  by  the 
centurion  at  Capernaum,  127. 

"  Synoptical  Gospels,"  the,  65,  317. 

Syr  ^phoenician  woman,  the,  and  her 
demoniac  daughter,  225. 

T. 

Tabernacles,  Feast  of,  Christ  at  the, 
252  et  uq.;  described,  253, 257, 261, 
267. 

Tabor,  Mount,  241,  462. 

Talents,  parable  of  the,  365. 

Talmud,  the,  210;  on  the  life  of 
Christ,  407 ;  on  His  death,  414. 

Taxe*,  capitation,  their  lawfulness,  347. 


Teaching  of  Jesus  not  borrowed,  40 ; 
its  character,  84,  122. 

Temple,  Jesus  in  the,  30 — 36;  fre- 
quented by  merchants  and  money- 
changers, 86 ;  purification  by  Christ, 
87;  described,  88,  359;  second 
cleansing  by  Christ,  334;  Christ 
foretells  the  destruction  of  the, 
364  ;  vail  of  the,  rent,  448. 

"  Temple  of  His  body,"  Christ  speaks 
of  the.  88. 

Temptation  of  Christ  in  the  wilder- 
ness, 54 — 64.  i 

Temptations  of  our  Lord,  other,  59. 

Thief,  the  repentant, on  the  cross,  443; 
legend  concerning  the,  443. 

Thieves  executed  with  Christ,  two,  435, 
443. 

Thirst  at  crucifixion,  447. 

Thirty  pieces  of  silver,  the,  329. 

Thomas,  the  Apostle,  116 ;  his  unbelief 
cured,  459. 

Tiberias,  town  of,  81,  83. 

Tiberius,  Roman  Emperor,  63. 

Tombs,  the  dwellings  of  demoniacs, 
155;  Jewish,  316,  454. 

Torah,  the,  353. 

Traditional  sayings  of  Christ,  206. 

Transfiguration,  the,  241—244. 

Travelling  in  the  East,  4. 

Tribute-money,  the  miracle  of  the, 
249—252. 

Tribute  to  Caesar:  we  Taxes. 

Triumphal  entry  into  Jerusalem,  331 — 
334. 

Twelfth  year,  the,  of  a  Jewish  boy,  31. 

Tyre  and  Sidon,  Christ  visits,  225. 

V. 

Via  DohroM,  436. 

Vine  and  Branches,  similitude  of  the, 

388. 
Virgins,  parable  of  the  Ten,  365. 

W. 

Washing  the  hands  and  feet  in  the 

East,  76. 

Washing  the  hands  by  Pilate,  432. 
Water  in  the  East,  96. 
"  Water  of  jealousy,"  ordeal  of,  261. 
.  Watar  of  Life,  97. 
Weddings,  Oriental,  74. 
Wedding-feast,  parable  of  the,  844. 
Widow,  the  sevenfold,  350. 
Widow,  the  poor,  and  her  abas,  359. 


472 


INDEX. 


Woe  denounced  against  ChorazinJ- 
Bethsaida,  &c.,  232,  279;  against 
the  Scribes  and  Pharisees,  355 — 
357. 

"  Woman,"  the  address,  76. 

Woman  with  an  alabaster  box  of 
spikenard  at  Simon  the  Pharisee's 
house,  137 ;  see  also  Mary  Mag- 
dalene. 

Woman,  infirm,  healed,  287. 

Woman  with  issue  of  blood  healed  by 
Jesus,  164. 


Woman  taken  in  adultery,  Christ's  do 
cision  in  the  case  of,  260 — 266. 

Women  at  the  Feast  of  the  Passover 
31. 

Writing,  the  only  reference  to  Christ's, 
263. 

Z. 

Zacchaius,  323. 
Zacharias,  356. 

Zebedee,  the  father  of  Jau:<ja  aud  John, 
117 


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